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Thursday, January 13
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Angela Dribben
Thursday January 13, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
The Stockbridge Library's second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

Angie Dribben’s debut collection, Everygirl, a finalist for the 2020 Dogfish Head Prize, is out with Main Street Rag in May 2021. She is Contributing Review Editor at Cider Press Review and Director of Internal Affairs at Southern Collective Experience. Her poetry, essays, mixed media, and reviews can be found or are forthcoming in Cave Wall, EcoTheo, Deep South, San Pedro River Review, Crab Creek Review, Crack the Spine, fatal flaw, up the staircase quarterly, patchwork lit, and others. Her poetry is widely-anthologized: Aunt Flo, I Wanna Be Loved By You (Marilyn Monroe Poems), Texas Review Press’ Virginia anthology, among others.
Speakers
Thursday January 13, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Friday, January 14
 

4:00pm EST

Birthright: A Virtual Poetry Reading with George Abraham
Friday January 14, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
George Abraham’s highly anticipated debut Birthright (Button Poetry, 2020) constructs a dialogue in which “every pronoun is a Free Palestine.” Through poems of immense emotion, and the use of alluring form, Abraham crafts work that examines what we come to own by existing. As trauma seeps through generations, can the body deconstruct its own inheritance? In a world that only takes, what is owed?

George Abraham is a Palestinian American poet and writer from Jacksonville, FL. Their debut Birthright won the Big Other Book Award and the Arab American Book Award in Poetry, and was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Bisexual Poetry. He is a board member for the Radius of Arab American Writers (RAWI), a recipient of fellowships from Kundiman and The Boston Foundation, and winner of the 2017 College Union Poetry Slam Invitational's Best Poet title. Their work has appeared in The NationAmerican Poetry ReviewThe BafflerThe Paris ReviewMizna, and elsewhere. A graduate of Swarthmore College and Harvard University, Abraham currently teaches at Emerson College and is a Litowitz MFA+MA Candidate at Northwestern University.
Speakers
Friday January 14, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, January 15
 

11:00am EST

Virtual Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Saturday January 15, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Saturday January 15, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
Online
  Online, Poetry Reading
 
Thursday, January 20
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Kathryn Petruccelli
Thursday January 20, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
The Stockbridge Library's second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

Kathryn Petruccelli is a bi-coastal performer and writer with an M.A. in teaching English language learners. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in New Ohio Review, Rattle, River Teeth’s Beautiful Things, december, SWWIM, Literary Mama, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, and others. Kathryn is a past winner of San Francisco’s Litquake essay contest and a finalist for the 2019 Omnidawn Broadside Poetry Prize.
Thursday January 20, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, January 23
 

2:00pm EST

Book Launch: Aporia by Eric E. Hyett
Sunday January 23, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Join Lily Poetry Review Books as we celebrate Eric Hyett's Aporia with special guest interviewer, Heather Nelson. In Aporia, the debut poetry collection by Eric E. Hyett, the poet struggles with a psychic predicament: how to guide his mother (poet Barbara Helfgott Hyett) through the ravages of early-phase Alzheimer’s Disease, while preserving both her dignity and her literary legacy. Organized chronologically to span exactly one year, the poems in Aporia recount a balletic narrative between the speaker and his mother, both of them trying to understand what has happened. Over the course of the year, what started out as shock gives way to grief, as both Hyett and his mother begin to move toward acceptance.
Sunday January 23, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Online
 
Monday, January 24
 

10:30am EST

Movement Language Nature Art workshop
Monday January 24, 2022 10:30am - 12:30pm EST
Movement Language Nature Art explores the inherently aesthetic organization of human first perception—movement-sound. Organized in utero as one perception movement-sound constitutes primary language—the kinship language we humans share with the many intelligences of the Natural World. Through guided imagery mediation, movement-sound explorations, and art-making through perceptual sequencing, participants follow an experiential pathway discovering the inner processes of primary language. This gives experience for participants to independently direct their own Nature immersion primary languaging session. From this experience participants make art—poetry, prose, and/or visual—through the immediacy of primary languaging processes.

Rebecca R Burrill is an ecocentric dancer, artistic director, and movement-based child developmentalist-educator. Her work focuses on the aesthetics of first perceptions—movement-sound—as primary language, the language of human kinship with Nature. She engages people of all ages in the experience of these deep psycho-biological processes, culminating in community ceremonial site-specific dance performance. $25
Monday January 24, 2022 10:30am - 12:30pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, January 25
 

5:00pm EST

Free Playful Poetry Workshop
Tuesday January 25, 2022 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
instructor - Danny Balel
takeaway - a few poems you’re welcome to present at our poetry reading on the 31st
requirements - something to write on. a phone or computer with Zoom.
time - Sunday Jan. 24th @ 5:00 - 6:30 EST

We’re hosting a free drop-in to help our community find their smiles and write something new. The theme for our upcoming poetry reading is “reflection | regeneration | renewal.” To get ready, we’re hosting a free drop-in to help our community find their smiles and maybe write something new to come and read. We hope to see you there!
Tuesday January 25, 2022 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
Online
 
Wednesday, January 26
 

7:00pm EST

Martín Espada with Luke Salisbury, Floaters
Wednesday January 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
Join Porter Square Books for a virtual reading from award-winning poet Martín Espada's latest collection Floaters!  The reading will be followed by a discussion with Luke Salisbury. This event is free and open to all, hosted on Crowdcast.

From the winner of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize come masterfully crafted narratives of protest, grief and love.
Martín Espada is a poet who "stirs in us an undeniable social consciousness," says Richard Blanco. Floaters offers exuberant odes and defiant elegies, songs of protest and songs of love from one of the essential voices in American poetry.

Floaters takes its title from a term used by certain Border Patrol agents to describe migrants who drown trying to cross over. The title poem responds to the viral photograph of Óscar and Valeria, a Salvadoran father and daughter who drowned in the Río Grande, and allegations posted in the "I’m 10-15" Border Patrol Facebook group that the photo was faked. Espada bears eloquent witness to confrontations with anti-immigrant bigotry as a tenant lawyer years ago, and now sings the praises of Central American adolescents kicking soccer balls over a barbed wire fence in an internment camp founded on that same bigotry. He also knows that times of hate call for poems of love—even in the voice of a cantankerous Galápagos tortoise.

The collection ranges from historical epic to achingly personal lyrics about growing up, the baseball that drops from the sky and smacks Espada in the eye as he contemplates a girl’s gently racist question.

Whether celebrating the visionaries—the fallen dreamers, rebels and poets—or condemning the outrageous governmental neglect of his father’s Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane María, Espada invokes ferocious, incandescent spirits.

Martín Espada has published more than twenty books as a poet, editor, essayist and translator, including Vivas to Those Who Have Failed and Pulitzer finalist The Republic of Poetry. His many honors include the Ruth Lilly Prize, the Shelley Memorial Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Born in Brooklyn, he now lives in western Massachusetts.

Luke Salisbury is an award winning author and Professor of English at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston. His interests range from Shakespeare to baseball, with the latter including a book The Answer is Baseball, and time spent as both vice president and national secretary for the Society of Baseball Research (SABR). No Common War, published in 2019, is his latest work. Mr. Salisbury attended The Hun School, New College, and received an MA in Creative Writing from Boston University. He once taught third grade in the Bronx, and now lives with his wife Barbara in Chelsea, Massachusetts.
Register here to join the event on Crowdcast: www.crowdcast.io/e/floaters
Wednesday January 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
 
Thursday, January 27
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Tres Abuelas y Una Mamá.
Thursday January 27, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Our second season of "Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Thursdays from 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. It will be your port in a worldly storm!

For two years, once a week, three abuelas and one mamá conversed around a table, sipping hibiscus tea, sharing stories, and writing, writing, writing. The tres abuelas are Maureen Seaton, Queen of Collaboration, Holly Iglesias, Mistress of Prose Poems, and Carolina Hospital, Guru of Juxtaposition; the mamá is Nicole Hospital-Medina, Alchemist of Vibes. The poems in Myth America are the joys of these get-togethers.
Thursday January 27, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Friday, January 28
 

7:00pm EST

Poetry Readings: Cheryl Savageau, David Surette, Ellen LaFlèche and Steven Riel
Friday January 28, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
You are invited to a Zoom meeting.
When: Jan 27, 2021 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Register in advance for this meeting:
https://maine.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZIlf-2upzkoE9H4Dv3L7KaQdI3N0JDHF5C9

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.


Friday January 28, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
 
Tuesday, February 1
 

5:00pm EST

reflection | regeneration | renewal Poetry Reading
Tuesday February 1, 2022 5:00pm - 6:00pm EST
As we enter this turbulent new year, let’s take an hour to reflect.

Students of our playful poetry course will be joined by members of the 3weeks community to read some original works, connect, and enjoy our mutual company.

Register to read at the link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfMxBEuvKXqALbRVW6L3m8lXDw4L7CCojS94zoMFp1SfUbN1Q/viewform
View the stream here: twitch.tv/2mbstudios
Tuesday February 1, 2022 5:00pm - 6:00pm EST
Online

5:45pm EST

WDtS Mattapan: The Return of Deconstructing the Short Story
Tuesday February 1, 2022 5:45pm - 7:30pm EST
Storytelling isn’t a world of rules. It’s a world of compromise. The stories you produce are born as much through discovery as they are through creation. And most short stories challenge us because so much of what we create and discover during this process has to be left out. In Deconstructing the Short Story, we’ll spend six weeks considering short storytelling tips, pulling apart short stories and discussing what does and doesn’t work, and, if time permits, workshopping parts of each other’s short stories. This class is for beginner and experienced writers alike. Newcomers and dabblers are encouraged to join.

Quentin Lucas is a Germany-born, Boston-raised bookworm. After meandering through college on his way to a degree in Business Management, he then adventured his way through the US Army and discovered a need to follow his passion for writing. As a freelancer, copywriter, and essayist, Quentin has worked on projects with MIT and Vistaprint, and has written for publications like the Huffington Post, The Good Men Project, Blerds Online, and Fourth River Literary Magazine. While awaiting the fall of 2019, when he will begin his MFA in Creative Writing at Emerson College, Quentin is crafting the second novel of his fantasy trilogy and is considering a memoir about his military days.
Speakers
Tuesday February 1, 2022 5:45pm - 7:30pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, February 5
 

11:00am EST

Virtual Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Saturday February 5, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Saturday February 5, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
Online
  Online, Workshop

7:00pm EST

40 Acres and A Slam:- Black History Month Edition: An Evening of Rhythm, Rhymes, and Reparations
Saturday February 5, 2022 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Done For DiDi is hosting an ONLINE poetry slam on Saturday, February 5 in celebration of Black History Month. Join us for an evening of rhythms, rhymes, and reparations and help raise funds for the 40 Acres and a School project - DiDi Delgado’s radical and urgent vision to build a Black Liberation epicenter on the colonized lands of New England. Poets and spoken word artists can register to perform or find out more here https://thedididelgado.com/40acresslam.
Saturday February 5, 2022 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, February 6
 

3:00pm EST

Poetry As Portraiture and Remembrance: Reading and Q&A with Moira Linehan and Angela Narciso Torres
Sunday February 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
The Concord Poetry at the Library Series invites you to join prize-winning poets Moira Linehan and Angela Narciso Torres who will read from their latest collections and engage in a Q&A about their practice. For more information, visit the Concord Poetry at the Library Series' website.

Sunday February 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

Poetry at the Y Reading Series (Virtually via Zoom) - POETRY READING & Open Mic
Sunday February 6, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Join us for a poetry reading with Wendy Drexler and Richard Waring, friends of the PoemWorks community, followed by an Open Mic (sign up by emailing host Richard Waring at rwaring@nejm.org).
Wendy Drexler’s third poetry collection, Before There Was Before, was published by Iris Press in 2017. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Barrow Street, J Journal, Lily Poetry Review, Nimrod, Pangyrus, Prairie Schooner, Salamander, Sugar House, The Atlanta Review, The Mid-American Review, The Hudson Review, The Threepenny Review, and the Valparaiso Poetry Review, among others. Her work has been featured on Verse Daily and WBUR’s Cognoscenti, and in numerous anthologies. She’s been the poet-in-residence at New Mission High School in Hyde Park, MA, since 2018, and is programming co-chair for the New England Poetry Club. Her website is www.wendydrexlerpoetry.com
 
Richard Waring is the author of the poetry collection, What Love Tells Me (Word Poetry, 2016)and a chapbook, Listening to Stones (Pudding House Publications, 1999). His work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including Sanctuary, Ars Medica, Comstock Review, JAMA, and the American Journal of Nursing. “Monarchs Passing Through New England” and “Night” have been set to music by composer Leander Frank. He hosts this monthly reading series and is senior layout artist for the New England Journal of Medicine.

*Contact host Richard Waring at rwaring@nejm.org for Zoom invitation.
Sunday February 6, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, February 8
 

2:00pm EST

Temple Sinai’s Twelfth Annual Poetry Festival Featuring Marge Piercy
Tuesday February 8, 2022 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
TBA
This year’s featured poet, Marge Piercy, is an American poet, novelist and social activist. She has published 20 books of poems and 17 novels including Women on the Edge of TimeHe, She, and It, which won the 1993 Arthur C Clarke Award, and Gone to Soldiers, a New York Times Best Seller, a sweeping historical novel set during World War II. Her book, The Art of Blessing the Day, focuses on poems with a Jewish theme. Born in Detroit, she is the recipient of four honorary doctorates. Marge Piercy is an active force in antiwar, feminist and environmental causes.
Tuesday February 8, 2022 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
TBA
 
Wednesday, February 9
 

6:30pm EST

Memoir Incubator Open House & Info Session
Wednesday February 9, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EST
Interested in taking your memoir to the next level? Join us for an informal Q&A session on our Memoir Incubator program. Instructor Alysia Abbott and alumni of the program will be there to answer any questions you have about the Memoir Incubator program. We'll give you all the information you need to know about the application process, what the program entails, the schedule, the philosophy behind our approach, and anything else on your mind.
Wednesday February 9, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EST
Online
 
Thursday, February 10
 

6:30pm EST

Memoir Incubator Open House & Info Session - Remote!
Thursday February 10, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EST
TBA
Interested in taking your memoir to the next level? Join us for an informal Q&A session on our Memoir Incubator program. Instructor Alysia Abbott and alumni of the program will be there to answer any questions you have about the Memoir Incubator program. We'll give you all the information you need to know about the application process, what the program entails, the schedule, the philosophy behind our approach, and anything else on your mind. To find out more about the program, click here.

Covid-19 Update
GrubStreet is planning to hold all of its classes using Zoom video conferencing until it becomes safe to meet in person in Boston. We are monitoring the public health situation closely, and while we expect this program will be able to meet in person in Boston eventually, all applicants should be prepared to participate via Zoom for as long as necessary.

Prospective applicants should either be local to Massachusetts/Boston area, or able to relocate in the event that the class can at some point meet in person. GrubStreet will be following the lead of health experts and the city of Boston, and working alongside other arts organizations in our decision-making regarding in-person classes. In the event that it’s absolutely safe to meet again, the opportunity will be provided to our intensive programs to gather in person. We will of course offer the possibility to participate remotely if a student is unable to attend in person for health reasons, but as with previous years, local community building is an integral aspect of these programs.

This info session will be hosted using Zoom! You will be able to participate in the event via Zoom video conference from wherever you’re most comfortable. All you’ll need is a laptop or a phone! About 15 minutes before this event is scheduled to begin, everyone who has registered for the event will receive an email with a link to join the event via Zoom – no need to download anything or sign up for Zoom in advance! If you have questions about remote learning, please feel free to reach out to programs@grubstreet.org for more information.
Speakers
Thursday February 10, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EST
TBA
 
Friday, February 11
 

4:00pm EST

Pondering the Pandemic During the Rust Years: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Joe Fusco
Friday February 11, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Joe Fusco Jr. is a well-seasoned poet and humorist from Worcester, Massachusetts. He is the author of four books of semi-amusing poems and essays: Pondering the Pandemic During the Rust Years (2021); Hmm…That’s Different (2020); Three Score (2014); and The Lost and Found Essays (2012), all available on Amazon. Joe’s musings have appeared in Damfino PressBallard Street PoetryWorcester ReviewAsinine Poetry, and the naughty ezine Clean Sheets. He was a co-winner of the Jacob Knight Poetry Award in 2002 and was named Best Poet by Worcester Magazine readers in 1999 and 2002. Joe is still a frequent contributor to Worcester Magazine and the last Worcester Mega-Slam winner in 2017. Joe has lived in lovely Worcester with his better half Cyndi and their large family for thirty-five years. He is a registered Independent and sleeps with one eye always open. More info on Joe can be found at joesyellowpad.com.
Speakers
Friday February 11, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Online

5:30pm EST

February Friday Night Writes
Friday February 11, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EST
What's more satisfying than leaving work behind on a Friday evening? Rounding out the week with a free virtual writing session, of course! Maximize that Friday night feeling and kick off your writing weekend with us online! Join us for a Friday Night Writes Session on Friday, February 11th, from 5:30pm-6:30pm, and log into GrubStreet Remote for some writing! In 60 jam-packed minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some great writing exercises. Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your evening and beyond. Please make sure to register ahead so we can email you a link to join!
Friday February 11, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, February 12
 

12:00pm EST

Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP): A Workshop of Weird
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
It’s okay if you’re not weird (or if you are, for that matter), but these prompts definitely lean to the weird side. The situations are a bit strange, the images are a bit wacky, but, hopefully, they’ll be more than a bit fun. Get ready to think about what might be and what could happen. If you’re the type to imagine mysterious notes left in odd places or things that (probably) shouldn’t be possible, this is the (free!) workshop for you. For writers age 13-18 ONLY.
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Online

12:00pm EST

Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP): Art Talks Back: Exploring Ekphrastic Poetry
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Art urges us to look more closely at the world around us, and at ourselves. In and around Boston, there’s an ever-changing gallery of portraits and messages from local artists. In this free generative writing workshop, participants will choose an image to have a “conversation” with. Each writer will be given prompts and questions in order to interact with their image. After having this dialogue with art, writers can pick eight of their favorite lines and arrange them into a working draft of an ekphrastic poem, to share with each other and the community. For writers age 13-18 ONLY.
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Online

12:00pm EST

Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP): Writing Inspired by Found Objects
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Have you ever found an old photograph at a flea market and wondered: who are these people, and what is their story? That’s how Ransom Riggs wrote Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, structuring the plotline entirely around found photographs. Using Miss Peregrine as our model, this course will be all about looking for inspiration for your writing in the objects that surround you, creating narratives out of things that already exist. We will look at an array of items––old photographs, video footage, antique maps, even junk and trash––and find the stories and poems hidden within. This course will also explore the relationship between images and words, looking at examples such as Brian Selznick’s Wonderstruck and Tom Phillips’s A Humument. A great course for those who are visual artists in addition to writers. For writers age 13-18 ONLY.
Saturday February 12, 2022 12:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

Shelter: The Art of Caring -- Virtual Poetry & Prose Reading
Saturday February 12, 2022 7:00pm - 8:15pm EST
TBA
Free event featuring Lowell writers & poets: Stephan Anstey, Diamond Asaneh, Suzanne Beebe, Douglas Bishop, MJ Bujold, Charles Gargiulo, Nancy Jasper, S.C. Thibodeau, and PJ Wamala. Their writings on the subject of “Shelter” were selected for inclusion in the community exhibit at the Arts League of Lowell, which this month (Feb 3rd-28th) is featuring an art show and sale with all proceeds to benefit the Lowell Transitional Living Center (LTLC). Hosted by Lowell poet Emily Ferrara, with special guest Alexis Ivy, homeless advocate and author of “Taking the Homeless Census.” Ivy will read poems from her book, followed by a Q&A on discussion topics on homeless advocacy, and what community members can do to better understand and make a positive impact for our fellow residents.
Saturday February 12, 2022 7:00pm - 8:15pm EST
TBA
 
Sunday, February 13
 

3:00pm EST

“A Walk in the Woo” Worcester’s Rain Poets Read
Sunday February 13, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Now that the snow is on the ground, we’re turning our thoughts to giving voice to the poetry that has filled Worcester’s rainy streets.

We have invited the poets who created the Rain Poems to share their work in a reading for friends and family at the Park View Room (just off Elm Park @ 230 Park Ave, Worcester).

The reading will take place on Sunday, February 13th, 2022, from 3-4 pm (with February 27th as a snow date).

Moderators Speakers

Sunday February 13, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Park View Room

7:30pm EST

CHAPTER AND VERSE LITERARY READING SERIES
Sunday February 13, 2022 7:30pm - 7:45pm EST
Now on Zoom! RSVP as below to attend.

Susan Buttenwieser is the author of the short story collection We Were Lucky with the Rain (Four Way Books). Her writing has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and appeared in numerous literary publications and received fellowships from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She contributes news features regularly to Women’s Media Center and teaches creative writing in New York City public schools in high-poverty neighborhoods, with incarcerated women and older adults. To purchase We Were Lucky with the Rain go to https://fourwaybooks.com/site/we-were-lucky-with-the-rain-by-susan-buttenwieser/.

Jennifer Martelli is the author of My Tarantella (Bordighera Press), selected as a 2019 “Must Read” by the Massachusetts Center for the Book and named as a finalist for the Housatonic Book Award. Her chapbook, After Bird, was the winner of the Grey Book Press open reading, 2016. In the Year of Ferraro was recently published by Nixes Mate. Her work has appeared in Verse Daily, Iron Horse Review (winner, Photo Finish contest), On the Seawall, The Sycamore Review, and Poetry. Jennifer Martelli has twice received grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council for her poetry. She is co-poetry editor for Mom Egg Review. You can order My Tarantella by going to www.bordigherapress.org. In the Year of Ferraro can be ordered from Nixes Mate Publishing https://nixesmate.pub/product/in-the-year-of-ferraro-·-jennifer-martelli/.

Scott Withiam’s latest book of poems, Doors Out of the Underworld, was published by MadHat Press in October 2019. Withiam has been a recipient of the Ploughshares Cohen Award, and the Two Rivers Review Chapbook and Drunken Boat Pan-Literary prizes. His first book, Arson & Prophets, came out with Ashland Poetry Press. Poems have been published by AGNI, Beloit Poetry Journal, Boston Review, Diagram, Indiana Review, Ploughshares, Plume, The Sun and elsewhere. He formerly taught college English Literature and writing and now works for a non-profit in the Boston area. Doors Out of the Underworld can be purchased online by going to https://madhat-press.com. Either or both books can be purchased by emailing the author at scwithiam@gmail.com.

To receive a Zoom invitation with a link to the reading, email your name and email address to SandeeStorey@fastmail.fm before 2 pm on Feb. 11. You will be emailed a Zoom invitation with the link by noon Feb. 12. For security reasons, please do not publicize, post or broadcast the Zoom link itself. If people you know want to attend, you may send them the link, but please ask them also not to publicize, post, or broadcast the link itself.

For more information, check our website at http://jamaicapondpoets.com or email dorothy.derifield@gmail.com or call 617-325-8388. The next Chapter and Verse Literary Reading on Zoom in the 2020/2021 series will be at 7:30 pm on Friday, March 12, 2021.
Sunday February 13, 2022 7:30pm - 7:45pm EST
Online
 
Wednesday, February 16
 

12:30pm EST

February Seaport Free Writes
Wednesday February 16, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EST
Looking to add some creativity to your day? Want to meet other local writers and get started on some new writing? Join our Seaport Free Writes session on Wednesday, February 16th, from 12:30-1:15pm. You’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some fresh writing exercises. Best of all, you’ll leave with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your day and beyond. Please note that you must register ahead of time and provide proof of vaccination to attend this session.
Wednesday February 16, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EST
GrubStreet Center for Creative Writing

12:30pm EST

February Grubby Desk Lunch
Wednesday February 16, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EST
Looking for some virtual mid-week writing community? Or do you have a little time during your lunch break for a chat and guided writing? Join our FREE Grubby Desk Lunch Series live via easy to use video conferencing. Join us on Wednesday, February 16th from 12:30pm-1:15pm. For 45 minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some cool writing exercises. Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your day and beyond. Please make sure to register ahead so we can email you a link to join! You can expect an email on February 16th around 12:15pm.

Meghan Lamb is the author of Failure to Thrive (Apocalypse Party, 2021), All of Your Most Private Places (Spork Press, 2019) and Silk Flowers (Birds of Lace, 2017). She has taught writing courses at Eötvös Loránd University, the University of Chicago, Interlochen Center for the Arts, and Washington University in St. Louis, and she served as the 2018 Philip Roth Writer in Residence at Bucknell University. Her work has appeared in Quarterly West, DIAGRAM, Redivider, Passages North, The Rumpus, and The Collagist, among other publications. She is currently the Nonfiction Editor of Nat. Brut, a journal of art and literature dedicated to advancing inclusivity in all creative fields.
Speakers
Wednesday February 16, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EST
Online
 
Thursday, February 17
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Owen Lewis
Thursday February 17, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Our second season of "Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Thursdays from 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

Owen Lewis, author of three collections of poetry, most recently Field Light (Distinguished Favorite, 2020 NYCBigBookAward), and two chapbooks including best man (recipient of the 2016 Jean Pedrick Chapbook Prize, New England Poetry Club.) Prizes include Finalist, 2017 Pablo Neruda Award, and first prize, the 2016 International Hippocrates Prize for Poetry. His poetry has appeared in Nimrod, Poetry Wales, The Mississippi Review, Southward, Stay Thirsty Poets, and Presence. A professor of psychiatry at Columbia University, he teaches Narrative Medicine in the Department of Medical Humanities and Ethics. Field Light, set in Glendale, Mass., weaves a poetic tapestry of Berkshire history.
Speakers
Thursday February 17, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online

7:30pm EST

2022 Michael True Memorial Reading
Announcing the 2022 Michael True Memorial Reading featuring Jonathan Blake.

Thursday, February 17, 2022
Curtiss Performance Hall
Tsotsis Family Academic Center
Assumption University
500 Salisbury St.
Worcester, MA  01609

The reading will be free and open to the public, though public health metrics may require a change to that plan.

Download the flyer feature artwork by Julie Chlapowski alongside a poem by feature Jonathan Blake.

Moderators Speakers

Thursday February 17, 2022 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Assumption College, Jeanne Y. Curtis Performance Hall in the Tsotsis Family Academic Center 500 Salisbury Street, Worcester, MA 01609-1296
 
Saturday, February 19
 

2:00pm EST

Booklovers’ Gourmet Open Mic Poetry Share
Saturday February 19, 2022 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Monthly Open Mic Poetry on the Third Saturday of (most) months, 2-4 pm.
Bring an original piece to share in a round-robin style.
Moderated by Robert Eugene Perry.

Booklovers' Gourmet
72 E. Main St.
Webster, MA  01570

**Masks are required for all attendees at this time.**

Space is limited so please RSVP to deb@bookloversgourmet.com or 508-949-6232.

Moderators
Saturday February 19, 2022 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Booklovers' Gourmet
 
Monday, February 21
 

11:00am EST

Virtual Panel Discussion Featuring New England Poets
Monday February 21, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
The Worcester Public Library is pleased to present a panel of poets who are in New England. Panelists Meg Kearney of New Hampshire, Tim Mayo of Vermont, and J.D. Scrimgeour of Massachusetts will read aloud some of their work, discuss what drew them to writing poetry, the struggles they’ve faced, and advice for aspiring poets.
In June 2021, The Word Works Press will publish Meg Kearney’s All Morning the Crows, winner of the 2020 Washington Prize for poetry. Meg is also author of An Unkindness of Ravens and Home By Now, winner of the PEN New England L.L. Winship Award; a heroic crown, The Ice Storm, published as chapbook in 2020; and three verse novels for teens. Her award-winning picture book, Trouper, is illustrated by E.B. Lewis. Meg’s poetry has been featured on Garrison Keillor’s “A Writer’s Almanac” and Ted Kooser’s “American Life in Poetry” series, and included in the 2017 Best American Poetry anthology (Natasah Tretheway, guest editor). She lives in New Hampshire and directs the Solstice MFA in Creative Writing Program in Massachusetts. Visit www.megkearney.com.

Tim Mayo has published two full length collections of poetry, The Kingdom of Possibilities (Mayapple Press, 2008), a finalist for the May Swenson Award and Thesaurus of Separation (Phoenicia Publishing, 2016) which among other awards was a finalist for both the 2017 Montaigne Medal and the 2017 Eric Hoffer Book Award. His two chapbooks are The Loneliness of Dogs (Pudding House Publications, 2007) and Notes to the Mental Hospital Timekeeper (Kelsay Books, 2019), which won Honorable Mention in the chapbook category of the 2020 Eric Hoffer Book Awards. Nominated for seven Pushcart Prizes, his poems and reviews have appeared in numerous literary magazines, among them, The American Journal of Poetry, Barrow Street, Narrative Magazine, ONE (Jacar Press), Poetry International, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Verse Daily, and The Writer’s Almanac. He lives in Brattleboro Vermont where he was a founding member of the Brattleboro Literary Festival, and where he continues to teach and work in a mental hospital. Visit www.tim-mayo.net.

J.D. Scrimgeour is the author of four poetry collections The Last Miles, Territories, Lifting the Turtle, and, most recently, Festival. He won the AWP Award for Nonfiction for his second book of nonfiction, Themes for English B: A Professor’s Education In & Out of Class. With musician Philip Swanson he released Ogunquit & Other Works, a CD blending music and poetry. A longtime resident of Salem, he’s written in many genres about the city. Mary Towne Eastey, an ancestor in his direct line, was put to death during the Salem Witch Trials. Another ancestor, Thomas Perkins, sat on the jury that found her guilty.
Speakers
Monday February 21, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
Online

2:00pm EST

Into the Mystery: The BodyPoem
Monday February 21, 2022 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Speak a poem with your body! Come join Slate Roof poets Audrey Gidman and Anna M. Warrock in the physical experience of language. What parts of the poem warrant motion? Does one image evoke the wrists, another the hips? Sign language? Shadowplay? Stillness? In this perfection-free zone, we’ll speak bodypoems, using short writing prompts to launch us into movement, invitation, physical questioning, and possible arrival. For poets and non-poets, adults and high-schoolers. $15

https://authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com/associated-programming/#SlateRoof
Speakers
Monday February 21, 2022 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, February 22
 

6:00pm EST

Novel Immersive for LGBTQ+ Writers Open House & Info Session
Tuesday February 22, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Thinking of applying to the Novel Immersive for LGBTQ+ Writers? Novel Immersive for LGBTQ+ Writers is a program uniquely designed to fill this void and help queer writers complete or make significant progress towards completing a draft of their novel in a supportive community. GrubStreet will host an online Q&A session with instructor Milo Todd on Tuesday, February 22nd, from 6:00-7:00 p.m. Milo will answer any questions you have about the Novel Immersive, including the workload, the application process, what the program does and doesn’t entail, the schedule, the philosophy behind our approach, and anything else you have on your mind! Please note that the upcoming round of the Novel Immersive for LGBTQ+ Writers, which begins in June 2022, will take place online via Zoom.

Milo Todd is a writer, editor, and educator represented by Michael Nardullo of LGR Literary. His fiction focuses on trans and queer history, with additional works on the trans experience and the trans body. His fiction has appeared in SLICE Magazine, Hare's Paw Literary Journal, Response Magazine, Foglifter Journal, Home is Where You Queer Your Heart (Foglifter Press), and Emerge: The 2019 Lambda Fellows Anthology (Lambda Literary Press). His other works have appeared on Writer Unboxed, Dead Darlings, GrubWrites, and Everyday Feminism, among others. Milo was selected as a 2020 Pitch Wars Mentee and a 2019 Lambda Literary Fellow in Fiction for his novel Downhead and received a fellowship to attend the Lambda Literary Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices. He was additionally selected for the 2021 Tin House Winter Workshop and received a 2021 Monson Arts residency. Milo is an Assistant Fiction Editor for Foglifter Journal and a Fiction Reader for Split Lip Magazine. He's an instructor at GrubStreet, where he teaches courses on fiction, the novel, and trans and non-binary representation in literature. He is an alum of GrubStreet’s Novel Incubator Program, where he received a Pechet Fellowship for his novel The Falcon of Doves. He has been on the selection committee for the Novel Incubator Program and the Bisexual Book Awards. He is a speaker on writing, inclusion, and the queer and trans experience. Milo has presented regularly at the Boston Book Festival and The Muse & The Marketplace. He curates Writing Beyond Binaries, a panel series celebrating trans and non-binary writers’ experiences in various stages of their careers. He consults on fiction manuscripts and transgender inclusion in the classroom.
Speakers Exhibitors
Tuesday February 22, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

A virtual Thirsty Lab with Moira Linehan
Tuesday February 22, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
The Thirsty Lab poetry reading, normally based out of Princeton, Mass., continues to meet virtually. On Tuesday, February 22, 2022, Moira Linehan will be the featured reader.

Visit the Zoom registration link to receive information on how to join the reading. Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and a link to join.

Moira Linehan is the author of four collections of poetry. Her first two books, If No Moon (2007) and Incarnate Grace (2015), were published by Southern Illinois University Press. If No Moon had been selected by Dorianne Laux as the winner of the 2006 Crab Orchard Series in Poetry open competition. Both books were named Honor Books in Poetry in the Massachusetts Book Awards. In June 2020 Slant Books published her third book, Toward and at the end of that year, Dos Madres Press brought out her latest, & Company. She lives in the greater Boston area.

For her February 22, 2022, Worcester County Poetry Association reading, Linehan will read from Toward. Many of its poems are set in landscapes where she had been awarded a writer’s residency. In particular, she will highlight those begun at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre in County Monaghan and the Cill Rialaig Project in Ballinskelligs, County Kerry.

Moderators Speakers

Tuesday February 22, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Zoom
 
Thursday, February 24
 

7:00pm EST

Book Launch for Harris Gardner's "No Time for Death"
Thursday February 24, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Welcome to a world where there is no time for death. It is a place and a state of mind, both for the temporal
and the spiritual with space for the mundane and the extraordinary. “No Time for Death” is Harris Gardner’s
fourth published collection; it is his first in fifteen years. This poetry collection is divided into three sections:
An Argument with Time; Contemplating Mortality Instead of My Navel; and Negotiating for An Afterlife. These are serious poems with an undercurrent of humor pervading many of them. The subject matter spans the spectrum of the human condition imbued with faith, hope, and the occasional flicker of regret. It is engaged with the busy-ness of living. “No Time for Death” offers an overarching theme: Take a breath, a revitalizing pause; as for Mortality, slow down; enjoy the most of each day-to-day. What’s the rush? Death can wait, can’t it?
Exhibitors
Thursday February 24, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Online
 
Friday, February 25
 

7:00pm EST

Martín Espada — Author of Floaters at the Odyssey Bookshop
Friday February 25, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Join us on Wednesday, February 24th, 7 pm on Crowdcast for a poetry reading by Martín Espada from his new book, Floaters. Espada will also be in conversation with Paul Mariani, former University Professor of Poetry at Boston College.

Questions about joining an online event? Email events@odysseybks.com for more info.

About the Book
From the winner of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize come masterfully crafted narratives of protest, grief and love.
Martín Espada is a poet who "stirs in us an undeniable social consciousness," says Richard Blanco. Floaters offers exuberant odes and defiant elegies, songs of protest and songs of love from one of the essential voices in American poetry.

Floaters takes its title from a term used by certain Border Patrol agents to describe migrants who drown trying to cross over. The title poem responds to the viral photograph of Óscar and Valeria, a Salvadoran father and daughter who drowned in the Río Grande, and allegations posted in the "I’m 10-15" Border Patrol Facebook group that the photo was faked. Espada bears eloquent witness to confrontations with anti-immigrant bigotry as a tenant lawyer years ago, and now sings the praises of Central American adolescents kicking soccer balls over a barbed wire fence in an internment camp founded on that same bigotry. He also knows that times of hate call for poems of love—even in the voice of a cantankerous Galápagos tortoise.
The collection ranges from historical epic to achingly personal lyrics about growing up, the baseball that drops from the sky and smacks Espada in the eye as he contemplates a girl’s gently racist question.
Whether celebrating the visionaries—the fallen dreamers, rebels and poets—or condemning the outrageous governmental neglect of his father’s Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane María, Espada invokes ferocious, incandescent spirits.

About the Panelists
Martín Espada has published more than twenty books as a poet, editor, essayist and translator. His new book of poems from Norton is called Floaters. Other books of poems include Vivas to Those Who Have Failed(2016), The Trouble Ball (2011), The Republic of Poetry (2006) and Alabanza(2003). He is the editor of What Saves Us: Poems of Empathy and Outrage in the Age of Trump (2019). He has received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Shelley Memorial Award, an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, the PEN/Revson Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship. The Republic of Poetry was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. His book of essays and poems, Zapata’s Disciple (1998), was banned in Tucson as part of the Mexican-American Studies Program outlawed by the state of Arizona, and reissued by Northwestern. A former tenant lawyer, Espada is a professor of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. http://www.martinespada.net/

From 1968 until 2000, PAUL MARIANI taught poetry at the University of Massachusetts/ Amherst and was the University Professor of Poetry at Boston College from 2000 until his retirement in 2016. He has published over 250 essays as well as 20 books, among them six biographies, including William Carlos Williams, Hart Crane, Robert Lowell, John Berryman, Gerard Manley Hopkins and Wallace Stevens, and eight volumes of poetry, most recentlyOrdinary Time: Poems (2020). He earned fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the NEA and the NEH, and was awarded the John Ciardi Lifetime Achievement Award and the Flannery O’Connor Lifetime Achievement Award. For over two decades he taught poetry workshops at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference and the Glen Workshops in Colorado and Santa Fe. His most recent book of essays is The Mystery of It All: The Vocation of Poetry in the Twilight of Modernity (2020).

Get Your Copy
Get your copy of Floaters here. To get a signed copy, visit our signed book order page.
Speakers

Friday February 25, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, February 26
 

9:00am EST

Authors and Artists Festival: Writing the Land
Saturday February 26, 2022 9:00am - 5:00pm EST
The third annual Authors and Artists Festival: Writing the Land is a celebration of the intersection of poetry with social- and ecological-justice, online February 26-27, 2022. All-BIPOC headline speakers include Saturday: Jillian Hishaw, Dina Gilio-Whitaker, John Francis; Sunday: Ross Gay, Rahawa Haile, and Latria Graham. Poets from the Writing the Land project www.writingtheland.org will read including Cheryl Savageau, JuPong Lin, David Crews, Angie Vasquez, Alice B. Fogel, Paul Richmond and many others. Please also see our online poet retreat Healing Ourselves, Healing the Planet Feb 25-27, 2022; and our free reading group meeting monthly. Entrance to the festival is free.

Details at: https://www.nature-culture.net/authors-artists-festival
Saturday February 26, 2022 9:00am - 5:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, February 27
 

9:00am EST

Authors and Artists: Writing the Land
Sunday February 27, 2022 9:00am - 5:00pm EST
The third annual Authors and Artists Festival: Writing the Land is a celebration of the intersection of poetry with social- and ecological-justice, online February 26-27, 2022. All-BIPOC headline speakers include Saturday: Jillian Hishaw, Dina Gilio-Whitaker, John Francis; Sunday: Ross Gay, Rahawa Haile, and Latria Graham. Poets from the Writing the Land project www.writingtheland.org will read including Cheryl Savageau, JuPong Lin, David Crews, Angie Vasquez, Alice B. Fogel, Paul Richmond and many others. Please also see our online poet retreat Healing Ourselves, Healing the Planet Feb 25-27, 2022; and our free reading group meeting monthly. Entrance to the festival is free.

Details at: https://www.nature-culture.net/authors-artists-festival

Sunday February 27, 2022 9:00am - 5:00pm EST
Online
 
Monday, February 28
 

2:00pm EST

Poetry Reading with Charles Coe
Monday February 28, 2022 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
Known for his powerful readings and unusually warm and compassionate voice, Charles Coe's poems speak to the heart and mind as well as the ear. He combines subjects as diverse as Afro-American history, myth, jazz, and family as well as surprising observations of those unexpected moments of joy to be found in a work-a-day city. Hear from one of our region's finest poets as he shares his sometimes humorous, sometimes poignant, but always insightful work. Coe will weave stories from his own life and reflections on his writing process through readings of poems from his 3 published collections. The reading will be followed by a Q&A session with the audience. A recipient of a Mass. Cultural Council fellowship in poetry, Coe served as an Artist-iin-Residence for the City of Boston in 2017 and is an Artist Fellow for Boston's St Botolph Club. Teaching poetry and prose is a special interest and he has taught in a wide variety of settings; currently he is an adjunct professor of English at Salve Regina University in Newport, Rhode Island, teaching poetry and non fiction in the low-residency MFA program. Presented by Arlington Commission for Arts and Culture in collaboration with Robbins Library and Arlington's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Division in conjunction with the launch of "Elevating Arlington's Voices of Color", a new collection welcoming poems, stories, essays, memoirs, photos, videos, diaries, artworks, and other digital artifacts from the Arlington Black, Indigenous and People of Color communities. Advance registration required at https://artisttalkcharlescoe.eventbrite.com
Monday February 28, 2022 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, March 1
 

7:00pm EST

Grubbie Debut: Neema Avashia with E. B. Bartels
Tuesday March 1, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Porter Square Books and GrubStreet are delighted to present the latest installment of the Grubbie Debut series with author and GrubStreet instructor Neema Avashia in celebration of the release of Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place. Neema will be joined in conversation by fellow author and GrubStreet instructor E. B. Bartels. This event will take place at Porter Square Books: Boston Edition- please RSVP for updates on venue and more.

Neema Avashia was born and raised in southern West Virginia to parents who immigrated to the United States. She has been a middle school teacher in the Boston Public Schools since 2003. Her essays have appeared in the Bitter Southerner, Catapult, Kenyon Review Online, and elsewhere. E.B. Bartels is a nonfiction writer, a former Newtonville Books bookseller, and a GrubStreet instructor, with an MFA from Columbia. Her writing has been published in Catapult, The Rumpus, The Millions, and The Toast. She lives in Massachusetts.
Tuesday March 1, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
GrubStreet Center for Creative Writing
 
Friday, March 4
 

12:30pm EST

MCC Visiting Writers Series presents Kevin Carey
Friday March 4, 2022 12:30pm - 1:45pm EST
Kevin Carey is a poet, fiction writer, playwright, & filmmaker. He has published three books of poetry, The One Fifteen to Penn Station (2012), Jesus Was a Homeboy (2016), & Set in Stone (2020), a new novel, Murder in the Marsh (2020), and a chapbook of short stories, The Beach People (2014). His play, The Stand or Sal is Dead, premiered at the Actor’s Studio in Newburyport (2018), & his one act plays have been staged at The New Works Festival in Newburyport & The New Hampshire Theater Project. His co-written screenplay Peter’s Song won Best Screenplay at the 2009 New Hampshire Film Festival. He has co-directed & co-produced two documentary films about poets, including Unburying Malcolm Miller which premiered at the Mass Poetry Festival in 2017. His fiction & poetry have appeared in The Red Mountain Review, Silk Road, Rip Tide: Crime Stories by New England Writers, & elsewhere. Kevin Carey is the Coordinator of Creative Writing at Salem State University.
Friday March 4, 2022 12:30pm - 1:45pm EST
Online

5:30pm EST

March Friday Night Writes
Friday March 4, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EST
What's more satisfying than leaving work behind on a Friday evening? Rounding out the week with a free virtual writing session, of course! Maximize that Friday night feeling and kick off your writing weekend with us online! Join us for a Friday Night Writes Session on Friday, March 4th, from 5:30pm-6:30pm and log into GrubStreet Remote for some writing! In 60 jam-packed minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some great writing exercises. Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your evening and beyond. Please make sure to register in advance so we can email you a link to join!

Michael Zendejas studies for a fiction MFA at UMass Amherst. He is an inaugural recipient of the Rose Fellowship, and was a fellow in the inaugural cohort of the Emerging Writers Fellowship given by Writers in the Schools (WITS). His work is featured or forthcoming in: Five2One Magazine, Liberation News, Peace, Land, and Bread Magazine, Acentos Review, Ginosko Literary Journal, Houston Review of Books, and elsewhere. Follow him on all platforms @Mikeafff
Speakers
Friday March 4, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, March 6
 

3:00pm EST

Sean Hill and Michael Kleber-Diggs: Concord Virtual Poetry at the Library Series
Sunday March 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Join Sean Hill and Michael Kleber-Diggs whose prize-winning poetry explores Black experiences in America, with home and family at its heart and visions for a nation in balance. A Q&A session will follow.

Born and raised in Milledgeville, Georgia, Sean Hill is the author of Dangerous Goods, awarded the Minnesota Book Award in Poetry, (Milkweed Editions, 2014) and Blood Ties & Brown Liquor, named one of the Ten Books All Georgians Should Read in 2015 by the Georgia Center for the Book, (UGA Press, 2008). From the poet whose stunning debut was praised as "transcendent" by Kevin Young, Dangerous Goods tracks its speaker throughout North America and abroad, illuminating the ways in which home and place may inhabit one another comfortably or uncomfortably, or both simultaneously. Hill has received numerous awards including fellowships from the Cave Canem Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, The MacDowell Colony, the University of Wisconsin, Stanford University, and the National Endowment for the Arts. His poems and essays have appeared in Callaloo, Harvard Review, New England Review, Orion, Oxford American, Poetry, Terrain.org, Tin House, and numerous other journals, and in almost two dozen anthologies including Black Nature and Villanelles. His poems have also been featured as part of the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series and on The Slowdown podcast hosted by Tracy K. Smith. Hill has taught at several universities, including the University of Alaska – Fairbanks and Georgia Southern University, and has also served as the director of the Minnesota Northwoods Writers Conference at Bemidji State University since 2012. He lives in Montana with his family and is currently a Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Montana. Visit his website at https://www.seanhillpoetry.com/.

Poet, essayist, and literary critic Michael Kleber-Diggs reads from his debut collection, Worldly Things, (Milkweed Editions, 2021), selected by Henri Cole as winner of the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize, finalist for the 2022 Minnesota Book Award in Poetry, and a New York Times Book Review "New & Noteworthy Poetry" Selection. “I am captivated, consoled, and bowled over by these poems, knifelike in their concision and oracular at their core,” observes Tracy K. Smith. In these poems, Kleber-Diggs names delight in the same breath as loss. With uncompromising candor, he documents the many ways America systemically fails those who call it home while also calling upon our collective potential for something better. “All of us want,” after all, “our share of light, and just enough rainfall.” Kleber-Diggs’ writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Poem-a-Day, Poetry Daily, Great River Review, Poetry Northwest, Potomac Review, Hunger Mountain, Memorious, and in several anthologies of essays. He has been a Fellow with the Givens Foundation for African American Literature, winner of the Loft Mentor Series in Poetry, and the former Poet Laureate of Anoka County libraries. His work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Since 2016, Kleber-Diggs has been an instructor with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. He also teaches Creative Writing in Augsburg University’s low-residence MFA program and at Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists. Visit his website at https://michaelkleberdiggs.com/

The Poetry Series is sponsored by the Friends of the Concord Free Public Library.

Sunday March 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online

3:00pm EST

Visions for a Nation in Balance: Sean Hill & Michael Kleber-Diggs
Sunday March 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Join renowned poets Sean Hill and Michael Kleber-Diggs who will read from their luminous, moving poetry on Black experiences in America, with home and family at its heart and visions for a nation in balance. A Q&A period follows.

Born and raised in Milledgeville, Georgia, Sean Hill is the author of Dangerous Goods, awarded the Minnesota Book Award in Poetry, (Milkweed Editions, 2014) and Blood Ties & Brown Liquor, named one of the Ten Books All Georgians Should Read in 2015 by the Georgia Center for the Book, (UGA Press, 2008).

From the poet whose stunning debut was praised as “transcendent” by Kevin Young, Dangerous Goods tracks its speaker throughout North America and abroad, illuminating the ways in which home and place may inhabit one another comfortably or uncomfortably, or both simultaneously. From the Bahamas, London, and Cairo, to Bemidji, Minnesota, and Milledgeville, Georgia, Hill interweaves the contemporary with the historical, and explores with urgency the relationship between travel, migration, alienation, and home. Here, playful “postcard” poems addressed to Nostalgia and My Third Crush Today sit alongside powerful reflections on the immigration of African Americans to Liberia during and after the era of slavery.

Hill has received numerous awards including fellowships from the Cave Canem Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, The MacDowell Colony, the University of Wisconsin, Stanford University, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Hill’s poems and essays have appeared in Callaloo, Harvard Review, New England Review, Orion, Oxford American, Poetry, Terrain.org, Tin House, and numerous other journals, and in almost two dozen anthologies including Black Nature and Villanelles. His poems have also been featured as part of the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series and on The Slowdown podcast hosted by Tracy K. Smith.

Hill has taught at several universities, including the University of Alaska – Fairbanks and Georgia Southern University. Hill has also served as the director of the Minnesota Northwoods Writers Conference at Bemidji State University since 2012. He lives in Montana with his family and is currently a Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Montana.

Poet, essayist, and literary critic Michael Kleber-Diggs reads from his debut collection, Worldly Things, (Milkweed Editions, 2021), winner of the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize and finalist for the 2022 Minnesota Book Award in Poetry and A New York Times Book Review “New & Noteworthy Poetry” Selection.

In these poems, Kleber-Diggs names delight in the same breath as loss. With uncompromising candor, he documents the many ways America systemically fails those who call it home while also calling upon our collective potential for something better. “All of us want,” after all, “our share of light, and just enough rainfall.”

“I am captivated, consoled, and bowled over by these poems, knifelike in their concision and oracular at their core,” notes Tracy K. Smith.

Among other places, Kleber-Diggs’ writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Poem-a-Day, Poetry Daily, Great River Review, Poetry Northwest, Potomac Review, Hunger Mountain, Memorious, and in several anthologies of essays. He has been a Fellow with the Givens Foundation for African American Literature, winner of the Loft Mentor Series in Poetry, and the former Poet Laureate of Anoka County libraries. His work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net.

Since 2016, Kleber-Diggs has been an instructor with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. He also teaches Creative Writing in Augsburg University’s low-residence MFA program and at Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists. He is married to Karen Kleber-Diggs, a tropical horticulturist and orchid specialist. Together, they have a daughter who is pursuing a BFA in Dance Performance at SUNY Purchase.

This event is sponsored by The Friends of the Concord Free Public Library.
Sunday March 6, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, March 13
 

4:00pm EDT

Thresh & Hold
Sunday March 13, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
THRESH & HOLD is a book of poems re-coded into a collaborative ceremony of composed and improvisational music, dance, poetry, and short film.

“Exhausted of singing in an empire’s hopeful choir,” Dekine’s poems play with past, present, and future, all held within any moment, remembering the power of Black imagination for collective ancestral healing. Join Marlanda Dekine for an evening-length, multimedia experience centered around their forthcoming full-length debut poetry collection, Thresh & Hold (Hub City Press, 2022).

With collaborative artists Victoria Lynn Awkward (Dance), Brittany J. Green (Composer), Mahkia Greene (Film), Zahili Gonzalez Zamora (Music), and Emily Bearce (Lights).
Speakers
Sunday March 13, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Boston Center for the Arts

7:30pm EDT

CHAPTER AND VERSE LITERARY READING SERIES
Sunday March 13, 2022 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Sally Bliumis-Dunn teaches Modern Poetry at Manhattanville College and offers individual manuscript conferences at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival. Her poems have appeared in New Ohio Review, The Paris Review, Prairie Schooner, PLUME, Poetry London, the NYT, PBS NewsHour, upstreet, The Writer’s Almanac, Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-day, and Ted Kooser’s  column, among others. In 2002, she was a finalist for the Nimrod/Hardman Pablo Neruda Prize. Her books include Talking Underwater and Second Skin (Wind Publications, 2007 and 2010); Galapagos Poems (Kattywompus Press, 2016); Echolocation (Plume Editions Madhat Press, 2018). Echolocation was long-listed or runner-up for Best Book of the Year from the Julie Suk Award, the Eric Hoffer Prize and the Poetry by The Sea Prize, all in 2018. To buy it: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1941196551/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1

Robert Carr is the author of Amaranth, published in 2016 by Indolent Books and The Unbuttoned Eye, a full-length 2019 collection from 3: A Taos Press. Among other publications, his poetry appears in The American Journal of Poetry, Massachusetts Review, On the Seawall, Rattle, Shenandoah and Tar River Poetry. Robert is a poetry editor with Indolent Books and recently retired from a career as Deputy Director for the Bureau of Infectious Disease and Laboratory Sciences at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. Additional information, including book purchase information, can be found at robertcarr.org

Jennifer De Leon is the author of Dont Ask Me Where I’m From (Atheneum/Simon & Schuster, 2020) and the editor of Wise Latinas (Univ. of Nebraska Press, 2014). An Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Framingham State University, and a faculty member in the MFA in Creative Nonfiction program at Bay Path University, she has published prose in over a dozen literary journals and is a GrubStreet instructor and board member. Her essay collection, White Space: Essays on Culture, Race, & Writing, is the recipient of the Juniper Prize and will be published by UMass Press in Spring 2021. Signed copies of her book may be ordered through Word on the Street Books: https://wordstreetbooks.indielite.org/ Ask for a signed copy in the checkout comment box. Bookshop.org is also an option (but not for signed copies): bookshop.org.

To receive a Zoom invitation with a link to the reading, email your name and email address to SandeeStorey@fastmail.fm before 2 pm on March 11. You will be emailed a Zoom invitation with the link by noon March 12. For security reasons, please do not publicize, post, or broadcast the Zoom link itself. If people you know want to attend, you may send them the link, but please ask them also not to publicize, post, or broadcast the link itself.

For more information, check our website at http://jamaicapondpoets.com or email dorothy.derifield@gmail.com or call 617-325-8388. The next Chapter and Verse Literary Reading on Zoom in the 2020/2021 series will be at 7:30 pm on Friday, April 9, 2021.
Sunday March 13, 2022 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, March 14
 

11:00am EDT

A Light Breeze from Kerry: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Curt Curtin
Monday March 14, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
As part of a virtual book tour, the Worcester Public Library is hosting a live reading with Curt Curtin and his wife Dee O'Connor. Curt is a first-generation Irish-American poet who grew up in Boston and lives in Worcester. Both his parents emigrated from County Kerry at the beginning of the 20th century, and their experiences inspired Curt's latest collection, Kerry Dancers.
Speakers
Monday March 14, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, March 15
 

7:00pm EDT

Emerson College Department of Writing, Literature & Publishing Reading Series: Special Guest Martín Espada
Tuesday March 15, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Please join the Department of Writing, Literature & Publishing for a very special event on Tuesday, March 15, 2022 at the Bill Bordy Theatre beginning at 7:00 p.m.

We are honored to be hosting the recipient of the 2021 National Book Awards 2021 for Poetry, Martín Espada. You are cordially invited to attend in-person at Bordy Theater, 216 Tremont St. or virtually. Those who cannot join us in-person are welcome to register to watch the event via livestream. If attending in-person, please complete the Covid attestation found on the Eventbrite registration page. Martín will be available to sign his book, Floaters, which we will have on sale that evening at the Bordy Theater.

Pre-registration is necessary for both in-person and virtual attendance.
Speakers
Tuesday March 15, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
The Bill Bordy Theatre of Emerson College
 
Thursday, March 17
 

4:00pm EDT

A Parade of Poets for St. Patrick's Day
Thursday March 17, 2022 4:00pm - 5:15pm EDT
Retired Professor Curt Curtin will be joined by three current students and three alumni from Westfield State University in a reading in honor of St. Patrick's Day. Students will read from their own work; Curt and is wife Dee O'Connor (also a WSU alum) will read selections from Kerry Dancers, Curt's latest collection focused on his Irish-American roots.

 Pre-registration info is forthcoming! 
Speakers
Thursday March 17, 2022 4:00pm - 5:15pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, March 18
 

11:00am EDT

Kerry Dancers: A Family Portrait in Poetry
Friday March 18, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
The Worcester Senior Center Celebrates St. Patrick's Day and the Worcester County Poetry Association's 50th anniversary with a reading from Kerry Dancers, Curt Curtin's newest poetry collection. Curt, his wife, and fellow poets/friends will read selected poems. You'll meet Da, Ma, Aunt Nora and the rest of the family, dance a reel in Boston's Hibernian Hall, and "shake the hand of the man who shook the hand" of notorious Boston Mayor James Michael Curley. With lively fiddle by members of the New England Enrichment Foundation, you'll be dancing in your seat.

This will air on Worcester Cable Station, Channel 192 subsequently be available on YouTube. Initial air time is estimated; program will run for several days after initial airing.
Friday March 18, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online

6:30pm EDT

Pakachoag Music School Presents Chasing Dreams to American Shores
Friday March 18, 2022 6:30pm - 7:00pm EDT
Musicians from Worcester's Pakachoag Music School provide fiddle music to accompany Curt Curtin's reading of selected poems from Kerry Dancers. Though the collection focuses on Curt's Irish-American heritage, it is a more generic immigrant's tale dedicated to "immigrants from around the world who chased their dreams to the American shores".

This pre-recorded event will stream on YouTube.
Friday March 18, 2022 6:30pm - 7:00pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, March 21
 

12:00pm EDT

Words Surviving Siege and War: Poems from Gaza
Monday March 21, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
This event features seven poets from Gaza-Palestine who in May 2021 were working to submit their poems to Peripheries while under Israeli attacks. Five of the poets write in Arabic while two, the co-editors of the special folio in 2021, are bilingual poets, writing in Arabic and English.

With readings by:

Mosab Abu Toha is a Palestinian poet, fiction writer, and essayist from Gaza. He is the founder of the Edward Said Public Library, and in 2019-2020 was a visiting poet and scholar at Harvard University. Abu Toha's debut poetry collection Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear is forthcoming from City Lights in April 2022.

Tayseer Abu Odeh is a writer and translator from Jordan. He is currently an assistant professor of comparative literature at Amman Al-Ahliyya University in Jordan.

Nasser Rabah is a Palestinian poet and writer who was born in Gaza. He still lives there today, where he has published five poetry collections and one novel in Arabic. Some of his poetry has been translated into English and French, among other languages. Rabah is member of the General Union of Palestinian Writers.

Born in 1992, Waleed Al-Akkad is a Palestinian poet and short story writer from Gaza. He graduated from Palestine University with a degree in media. Waleed occasionally writes plays. As an undergraduate he won the drama contest at Palestine University.

Born in Libya in 1994, Hamed Ashour is a Palestinian poet living in Gaza. He obtained his BA in Social Work from Al-Quds Open University in Gaza. His collection Wounds That Lick Themselves received special mention by the Qattan Foundation-Palestine's Young Writer’s contest committee and was then published by Al-Ahlia-Jordan in 2018.

Ne’ma Hasan is a Palestinian poet and prose writer with a degree in counselling. Ne’ma is a cultural activist and heads two women’s literary and cultural groups in South Gaza. She is author of four books.

Mona Al-Mosaddar is a Palestinian poet and writer. She obtained her BA in English Literature from Al-Aqsa University in Gaza. She works as a translator and writes essays in Arabic and English. Mona published two Arabic poetry collections.

Harvard University welcomes individuals with disabilities to participate in its programs and activities. If you would like to request accommodations or have questions about the digital access provided, please contact Ariella Ruth Goldberg, at agoldberg@hds.harvard.edu or 617-495-4476 in advance of your participation.
Monday March 21, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Online

2:30pm EDT

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien: Syllabics From Basho to Yeats and Beyond
Monday March 21, 2022 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Do you remember clapping out the syllables of your name in first grade? Pure syllabic poetry is common in languages like Japanese but rarer in English, which counts both syllables and stresses. Starting with haikus, we will try our hands at writing tankas, nonets, roundels, cinquains, and diamantes. And as we go along, we’ll applaud each other’s syllabic creations and explore how poets like Yeats, Thomas and Plath used the syllabic form.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday March 21, 2022 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, March 22
 

3:00pm EDT

Concord Poetry at the Library Series presents: An Afternoon with Allison Adair and Tiana Clark
Tuesday March 22, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Join acclaimed poets Allison Adair and Tiana Clark who will read from prize-winning debut collections and talk about their inspiration, influences, and some essential elements of craft in developing the poems in these books.

Allison Adair’s debut collection, The Clearing, selected by Henri Cole for Milkweed’s Max Ritvo Poetry Prize, was named a New York Times "New and Noteworthy" book. From the midst of the Civil War to our current era, Adair charts fairy tales that are painfully familiar, never forgetting that violence is often accompanied by tenderness. Described by Cole as “haunting and dirt caked,” her unromantic poems of girlhood, nature, and family linger with an uncommon, unsettling resonance. Adair’s poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Arts & Letters, Best American Poetry, Kenyon Review, Waxwing, and ZYZZYVA; and have been honored with the Pushcart Prize, the Florida Review Editors’ Award, the Orlando Prize, and first place in the Mid-American Review Fineline Competition. Originally from central Pennsylvania, Adair lives in Boston, where she teaches at Boston College and Grub Street.

Tiana Clark’s (author photo credit: Crystal K Marteldebut) full-length poetry collection, I Can’t Talk About the Trees Without the Blood (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018) is winner of the 2017 Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize and the 2020 Kate Tufts Discovery Award.  Clark is also the author of Equilibrium (Bull City Press), selected by Afaa Michael Weaver for the 2016 Frost Place Chapbook Competition. She is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow, a Pushcart Prize, the 2017 Furious Flower’s Gwendolyn Brooks Centennial Poetry Prize, and the 2015 Rattle Poetry Prize. She was the 2017-2018 Jay C. and Ruth Halls Poetry Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute of Creative Writing. Clark has received fellowships to the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, Sewanee Writers' Conference, and Kenyon Review Writers Workshop. She is a graduate of Vanderbilt University’s M.F.A. program where she served as the poetry editor of the Nashville Review. Her writing has appeared in or is forthcoming from The New Yorker, Poetry Magazine, The Washington Post, VQR, Tin House Online, Kenyon Review, American Poetry Review, Oxford American, The Atlantic, and elsewhere. Clark teaches creative writing at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.

Sponsored by The Friends of the Concord Free Public Library in Concord, Massachusetts  

Tuesday March 22, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

A virtual Thirsty Lab with JC Todd
Tuesday March 22, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
The Thirsty Lab poetry reading, normally based out of Princeton, Mass., continues to meet virtually. On Tuesday, March 22, 2022, JC Todd will be the featured reader.

Visit the Zoom registration link to receive information on how to join the reading. Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and a link to join.

Moderators Speakers

Tuesday March 22, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Wednesday, March 23
 

7:00pm EDT

Princeton Women’s Poetry Reading
Wednesday March 23, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Join a gathering of 20+ women on Wednesday, March 23, 2022, for the annual Princeton Women’s Poetry Reading organized by Susan Roney-O’Brien. The event will start at 7:00 pm and will be held using a Zoom online meeting. The Princeton Public Library has agreed to co-sponsor the event along with the Worcester County Poetry Association.

Visit the Zoom registration link to receive information on how to join the reading. Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and a link to join.

Expected to read are the following women (a * indicates a first-time reader at the event).
Kathleen Aguero *
Polly Brown
Devon Evans *
Kathleen Fagley *
Claire Golding
Sharon Ann Harmon *
Joyce Heon
Meg Kearney *
Andrea MacRichie *
Muriel Nelson *
Dolores Paljus *
Kyle Potvin *
Catherine Reed
Eve Rifkah
Susan Roney-O’Brien
Karen Sharpe
Nancy Strong
Francine Sterle *
Beth Sweeney
bg Thurston
Loretta Watts

Moderators
Wednesday March 23, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Thursday, March 24
 

7:00pm EDT

Across the Tracks: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Curt Curtin
Thursday March 24, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
In this final book launch event, Curt Curtin and his wife Dee O'Connor will read some of the lesser-known poems from Curt's newest collection, Kerry Dancers. Selected poems include "Across the Tracks," "Ma," "Eldest Sister," and "Paying respects at Katie's Wake" along with many popular favorities from his Irish-American heritage. As fellow poet, Susan Roney O'Brien, says, "[We] want to be caught in the ballad, the hornpipe, the reel--want to be pulled into the dance."
Speakers
Thursday March 24, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, March 29
 

7:00pm EDT

CANCELED - A virtual Thirsty Lab with Jenith Charpentier
Tuesday March 29, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
We regret that tonight's reading by Jenith Charpentier is being canceled.


Tuesday March 29, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Wednesday, March 30
 

6:00pm EDT

Poetry Extravaganza at Root and Press Café and Books Hosted by Joe Fusco Jr. & Featuring Paul Szlosek
Wednesday March 30, 2022 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
We’re back but the last Wednesday of the month now!
Join us for the open mic then our Feature Performer, the amazing Paul Szlosek.
Doors open at 530pm. A plethora of beverages and light snacks will be available.
Sign up for the open mic at jfjr6969@gmail.com, Please!
Paul Szlosek is a poet residing in Worcester, Massachusetts, and was co-founder and co-host of both The Poet’s Parlor and The Poetorium at Starlite Featured Poetry Open Mic & Reading Series in the nearby town of Southbridge. A past recipient of the Jacob Knight Award for Poetry and third place winner of the Worcester County Poetry Association’s 2020 Frank O’Hara Poetry Prize, his poems have appeared in numerous publications both online and in print including the Worcester Review, Worcester Magazine, Sahara, Radius, Concrete Wolf, Sikworm, Star*Line, Diner, and We Are BEAT: National Beat Poetry Foundation Anthology. Paul’s probably best known in the Worcester poetry community for his fanatical obsession with obscure poetry forms, and has invented his own including the ziggurat, the streetbeatina, the hodgenelle, and the singsangsong which he shares on his blog Paul’s Poetry Playground @ https://playground.poetry.blog.
Support a local, small business and Worcester’s literary scene. Join us!
Sponsored by D’Errico’s Supermarkets


Wednesday March 30, 2022 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Root and Press LLC
 
Friday, April 1
 

6:00pm EDT

2022 Juniper Literary Festival: Mona Awad and Mai Der Vang
Friday April 1, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Join us for a reading with novelist Mona Awad and poet Mai Der Vang. Awad’s latest novel, All’s Well, is a searing indictment on society’s collective refusal to witness and believe female pain. Vang’s Yellow Rain, a 2022 Pen America Literary Award finalist, is a work of documentary, poetry and collage that calls out the erasure of a history, and the silencing of Hmong refugees. A book signing and reception will follow.

Mona Awad is the author of Bunny, named a Best Book of 2019 by TIMEVogue, and the New York Public Library. It was a finalist for the New England Book Award and a Goodreads Choice Award. It is currently in development for film with Jenni Konner and New Regency Productions. Awad's first novel, 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl, was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and winner of the Colorado Book Award and the Amazon Canada First Novel Award. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times MagazineVogueTIMEMcSweeney’sPloughshares, and elsewhere. She teaches fiction in the Creative Writing program at Syracuse University. Her new novel, All’s Well, has been named a best or most anticipated book of summer by Entertainment WeeklyO Magazine, Goodreads and many more.

Mai Der Vang is the author of Yellow Rain (Graywolf Press, 2021), and Afterland (Graywolf Press, 2017), winner of the 2016 Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets, longlisted for the 2017 National Book Award in Poetry, and a finalist for the 2018 Kate Tufts Discovery Award. She was also the co-editor of the anthology How Do I Begin? A Hmong American Literary Anthology (Heyday, 2011). She has been an assistant professor in the Creative Writing MFA Program at Fresno State University since 2019.

The 2022 Juniper Literary Festival is a program of the University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers’ Juniper Initiative and made possible with generous support from Mass Cultural CouncilUMass Arts CouncilCollege of Humanities & Fine ArtsDepartment of EnglishDepartment of Languages, Literatures, and CulturesWomen of Color Leadership NetworkArts Extension ServiceOffice of the Provost and Graduate School.
Speakers

Friday April 1, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Old Chapel, University of Massachusetts Amherst

8:00pm EDT

2022 Juniper Literary Festival: Live Lit
Friday April 1, 2022 8:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Join us for Live Lit, the long-standing reading series run by and featuring current students in the University of Massachusetts Amherst's MFA program for Poets and Writers.

The 2022 Juniper Literary Festival is a program of the University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers’ Juniper Initiative and made possible with generous support from Mass Cultural CouncilUMass Arts CouncilCollege of Humanities & Fine ArtsDepartment of EnglishDepartment of Languages, Literatures, and CulturesWomen of Color Leadership NetworkArts Extension ServiceOffice of the Provost and Graduate School.


Friday April 1, 2022 8:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Old Chapel, University of Massachusetts Amherst
 
Saturday, April 2
 

4:00pm EDT

2022 Juniper Literary Festival: Emily Hunt, Robin McLean, Wendy Xu, and Jung Yun
Saturday April 2, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Join us as we welcome back four UMass MFA alumni for a reading and conversation. A book signing and reception will follow.

Emily Hunt (MFA '13) is the author of the poetry collection Dark Green, named a “standout debut” by Publishers Weekly and a "Must-Read Poetry Debut" by Lit Hub, and the chapbook Company. Claudia Rankine selected Hunt’s manuscript-in-progress Stranger as an honorable mention in the 2020 Donald Hall Prize for Poetry competition. Hunt has also published two books of visual art: Cousins and This Always Happens. She lives and teaches in New York.

Robin McLean (MFA '11) was a lawyer and then a potter for 15 years in the woods of Alaska turning to writing at UMass Amherst. Her first short story collection Reptile House, twice a finalist for the Flannery O’Connor Prize, won the BOA Editions Fiction Prize and was noted as a best book of 2015 in Paris Review. Her debut novel Pity the Beast was published in November 2021 and named a Best Book of Fiction in The Guardian. Her collection of short fiction Get 'em Young, Treat 'em Tough, Tell 'em Nothing will be published in October 2022. She now directs the Ike’s Canyon Writers Retreat in the high plain desert of central Nevada.

Wendy Xu (MFA '14) is most recently the author of the poetry collection The Past, just published by Wesleyan in September 2021, and Phrasis, named one of the 10 Best Poetry Books of 2017 by The New York Times Book Review. Her work has appeared in The Best American PoetryGrantaTin HousePoetryAmerican Poetry ReviewConjunctions, and widely elsewhere. She is assistant professor of writing at The New School, where she teaches poetry.

Jung Yun (MFA '07) is the author of O Beautiful (St. Martin’s Press, 2021), which was a New York Times Editors’ Choice and Group Text selection, and Shelter (Picador, 2016), which was long-listed for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and a finalist for the Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award. Her work has appeared in Tin HouseThe Massachusetts ReviewThe Indiana ReviewThe AtlanticThe Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Review of Books, among others. Currently, she lives in Baltimore and serves as an Assistant Professor of English at the George Washington University. She also serves on the boards of directors at the PEN/Faulkner Foundation and the Alan Cheuse Center for International Writers.

The 2022 Juniper Literary Festival is a program of the University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers’ Juniper Initiative and made possible with generous support from Mass Cultural CouncilUMass Arts CouncilCollege of Humanities & Fine ArtsDepartment of EnglishDepartment of Languages, Literatures, and CulturesWomen of Color Leadership NetworkArts Extension ServiceOffice of the Provost and Graduate School.

Saturday April 2, 2022 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Old Chapel, University of Massachusetts Amherst
 
Sunday, April 3
 

2:00pm EDT

Four Jennifers
Sunday April 3, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Four Jennifers joins Lily Poetry Salon as we celebrate National Poetry Month with Jennifer Jean, Jennifer Markell, Jennifer Martelli, and Jennifer Militello. Jennifer Militello is the author of the poetry collection The Pact (Tupelo Press/Shearsman Books, 2021) and the memoir Knock Wood, winner of the Dzanc Nonfiction Prize (Dzanc Books, 2019), as well as four additional collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in Best American Poetry, Best New Poets, American Poetry Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The Paris Review, and POETRY. She teaches in the MFA program at New England College. Jennifer Martelli is the author of The Queen of Queens and My Tarantella, selected as a “Must Read” by the Massachusetts Center for the Book, as well as the chapbooks "In the Year of Ferraro" and "After Bird", winner of Grey Book Press’s open reading. Her work has appeared in The Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, The Tahoma Literary Review, and Poetry. Jennifer Martelli has twice received grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council for poetry. Jennifer Markell’s first poetry collection, Samsara, (Turning Point, 2014) was named a “Must Read” book by the Massachusetts Book Awards. Her second collection, Singing at High Altitude was published by The Main Street Rag (November, 2021). Jennifer’s work has appeared in The Bitter Oleander, The Cimarron Review, Consequence, and RHINO, among other publications. She works as a psychotherapist, serves on the board of the New England Poetry Club, tends two gardens and three well-versed cats. Jennifer Jean is the author of the poetry collection Object Lesson (Lily Books, 2021) and Object Lesson: a Guide to Writing Poetry (Lily Books, 2021). The recipient of a Peter Taylor Fellowship from the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, a Disquiet FLAD Fellowship from Dzanc Books, and an Ambassador for Peace Award from the Women’s Federation for World Peace, she is the program manager of 24PearlStreet, the Fine Arts Work Center’s online writing program.
Sunday April 3, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, April 6
 

10:00am EDT

Zoom Workshop - Line Breaks
Wednesday April 6, 2022 10:00am - 11:00am EDT
Tips and tricks for improving your poetic line. All are welcome. No fee. Email Adam to register or if you have questions at adam@gloucesterwriters.org. Zoom link will be sent upon registration.
Speakers
Wednesday April 6, 2022 10:00am - 11:00am EDT
Online
 
Thursday, April 7
 

7:00pm EDT

Haleh Liza Gafori, author of Gold, with Kythe Letitia Heller at Porter Square Books: Cambridge Edition
Thursday April 7, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Porter Square Books is delighted to welcome Haleh Liza Gafori for Gold, a new translation of Rumi that has been called "ecstatic and piercing." Gafori will be joined in conversation by writer, interdisciplinary artist, and doctoral candidate at Harvard University Kythe Letitia Heller. This event will take place in person at our Cambridge location on Thursday, April 7 at 7pm. It's free to attend, but space will be limited, so be sure to register for your free ticket below.

Rumi’s poems were meant to induce a sense of ecstatic illumination and liberation in his audience, bringing its members to a condition of serenity, compassion, and oneness with the divine. They remain masterpieces of world literature to which readers in many languages continually return for inspiration and succor, as wellas aesthetic delight. This new translation by Haleh Liza Gafori preserves the intelligence and the drama of the poems, which are as full of individual character as they are of visionary wisdom.

Marilyn Hacker praises Gafori’s new translations of Rumi as “the work of someone who is at once an acute and enamored reader of the original Farsi text, a dedicated miner of context and backstory, and, best of all, a marvelous poet in English.”

Thursday April 7, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Friday, April 8
 

6:00pm EDT

Martín Espada - A Reading, Book Signing, and Reception
Friday April 8, 2022 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
The Arms Library and Friends of the Arms Library are having a celebration for internationally renown poet Martín Espada. Martín is the winner of the National Book Award for Poetry for his book Floaters: Poems.
April 8th, beginning at 6 p.m. at the Shelburne-Buckland Community Hall, 53 Main Street, Shelburne Falls, MA
Introducing Martín will be Paul Mariani, an American poet and University Professor Emeritus at Boston College.

Martín and his wife Lauren moved into Shelburne Falls at the beginning of the pandemic and are looking forward to meeting more of the community beginning with this gathering.

Following Martín's reading there will be a book signing, with books offered at a special Shelburne Falls discount, and a reception with refreshments.

The event is free. Masks are required at the gathering.

We thank Martín for his donation of copies of Floaters, and many of his other books, to the Arms Library! They are available to borrow.

Please call the Arms Library at 413-625-0306 or email armslibrary@gmail.com to let us know you are planning to attend. If emailing we will send you an evite.
Speakers
Friday April 8, 2022 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Shelburne-Buckland Community Hall
 
Saturday, April 9
 

11:00am EDT

What’s Next? The Story of One Creative Journey
Saturday April 9, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Judith Ferrara traces the source of inspiration that sustained over three decades of creativity resulting in poetry, blogs, paintings, and an upcoming biography/memoir of Yetta Dine, mother of poet Stanley Kunitz (TidePool Press).

Judith Ferrara’s poems, essays and artwork have appeared in several books and numerous journals. In 2018, she received the Stanley Kunitz Medal from the Worcester County Poetry Association She was awarded a 2003 Worcester Cultural Commission/Massachusetts Cultural Council Creative Arts Fellowship. A Few Sweet Drops in My Bitter Cup, a biography/memoir of Yetta Dine, mother of poet Stanley Kunitz, from TidePool Press, is forthcoming this year.
Speakers
Saturday April 9, 2022 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, April 11
 

3:00pm EDT

The Cambridge Poetry MashUp: The KickOff
Monday April 11, 2022 3:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
TBA
YOU ARE INVITED to: The Cambridge Poetry MashUp in April 2021, a National Poetry Month celebration. The series of events will celebrate the poetic and cultural diversity of poets who live in Cambridge, MA & its neighboring cities. Artists from other states will join us. Poetry, Song, and Storytelling shall abound.

Join us for the first event in Cambridge Poetry MashUps National Poetry Month series! Details forthcoming.

https://www.poetrymashup.org/
Monday April 11, 2022 3:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
TBA
 
Tuesday, April 12
 

7:00pm EDT

Erika Meitner, author of Useful Junk, and Sarah Matthes, author of Town Crier, at Porter Square Books: Cambridge Edition
Tuesday April 12, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Just in time for National Poetry Month, Porter Square Books is delighted to welcome poets Erika Meitner and Sarah Matthes for a joint reading from their latest collections. Hear from Meitner's Useful Junk, lauded as "tragicomic-erotic-nostalgic with a twist of existential dread and a cherry of wit on top" and Matthes' Town Crier, a collection of Kabbalistic poems that recognize wit as a ritual of mourning and the winner of the 2020 Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize.

Tuesday April 12, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Wednesday, April 13
 

7:30pm EDT

SRP Broadside Reading & Craft Talk with Jendi Reiter & Armen Davoudian
Wednesday April 13, 2022 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Armen Davoudian and Jendi Reiter, winners of Slate Roof's Glass Broadside Contest, will read their winning poems and other work. A craft talk follows the reading, featuring our master letterpress printer, Ed Rayher, and artist J. Hyde Meissner, who will describe the process of creating the woodcuts and producing the broadsides printed on a Vandercook Universal. The evening closes with an audience Q&A. Hosted by Slate Roof Press www.slateroofpress.com. To register go to https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZElcOurqTkoEtGVKMvNLQUk6xnO6-bg3Vpa 

Armen Davoudian is the author of Swan Song, which won the 2020 Frost Place Chapbook Competition. His poems and translations from Persian appear in AGNI, The Sewanee Review, The Yale Review, and elsewhere. He grew up in Isfahan, Iran and is currently a PhD candidate in English at Stanford University.

Jendi Reiter is the author of the novel Two Natures (Saddle Road Press, 2016), the short story collection An Incomplete List of My Wishes (Sunshot Press, 2018), and four poetry books and chapbooks, most recently Bullies in Love (Little Red Tree, 2015). Awards include a Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowship for Poetry, the New Letters Prize for Fiction, the Wag's Revue Poetry Prize, the Bayou Magazine Editor's Prize in Fiction, and two awards from the Poetry Society of America. Two Natures won the Rainbow Award for Best Gay Contemporary Fiction and was a finalist for the Book Excellence Awards and the Lascaux Prize for Fiction. Reiter is the editor of WinningWriters.com, an online resource site with contests and markets for creative writers. Visit JendiReiter.com.

Wednesday April 13, 2022 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Zoom
 
Thursday, April 14
 

5:30pm EDT

Everywhere You Look: Writing Poetry Inspired by Your Experiences & Everyday Life
Thursday April 14, 2022 5:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Do you enjoy writing poetry but struggle to think of new ideas for your work? Are you looking for new brainstorming activities or prompts that can help you generate new poems and give you the freedom to write about themes or topics that resonate with you? Well, what if part of the answer to both questions is to look at your life and the world around you with fresh eyes and an open mind? Then join poet, book editor, and writing coach Sara Letourneau via Zoom for Everywhere You Look: Writing Poetry Inspired by Your Experiences and Everyday Life on Thursday, April 14, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. Eastern. This three-hour poetry-writing workshop is driven by one of Sara’s core beliefs about the craft of this genre: “You can find poem ideas everywhere.” Using this principle, we’ll read work by poets such as Sandra Beasley, January Gill O’Neil, and Aimee Nezhukumatathil, then discuss how they find inspiration in places both familiar and unexpected. We’ll also explore different ways that our experiences and everyday lives can inspire our poetry through brainstorming exercises that segue into in-class writing periods. When the workshop is done, you’ll come away with new work in progress, ideas for future poems, and a better understanding of how what’s extraordinary about the seemingly ordinary can spur more of your writing down the road. All poets are welcome to this workshop! So no matter if you are new to writing poetry, have been writing it for years, or are returning to it after a long hiatus, chances are you’ll enjoy this event, be surprised by how easy the brainstorming activities can be, and learn from Sara’s “eyes wide open” approach to being inspired. Also, poets of all genders, colors, creeds, and sexual orientations are welcome to this event. Please bring a notebook or journal and your favorite writing utensil(s) to this workshop. This poetry workshop will be hosted online using Zoom. You don't need to have a Zoom account to attend, but make sure you have access to a computer, tablet, or mobile device with a webcam as well as email and an internet connection to register and attend. If you prefer, you can listen to the class on your phone. Depending on when you sign up, you'll receive the sign-in details and the poems we’ll read and discuss in class either the morning of the event or one hour before the event begins.
Exhibitors
Thursday April 14, 2022 5:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, April 15
 

7:00pm EDT

Poets of Worcester Present: A Writing Workshop with Worcester’s Poet Laureates
Friday April 15, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join the City of Worcester’s Poets Laureate Juan Matos and Amina Mohammed for a Poetry Writing Workshop! Experienced poets and novices, teens and adults alike are invited to join this virtual workshop and hear the experiences of the Poets Laureate, who will share some of their works and guide attendees through creating their own poetry. In celebration of National Poetry Month, this Poetry Writing Workshop is hosted in partnership between the Worcester Public Library and the City of Worcester’s Cultural Development Division. For ages 16+.

Juan Matos earned a Master's Degree in bilingual education at Worcester State University and went on to teach Spanish Literature and ESL for 32 years, the last 22 of which in Worcester Public Schools. During this time he wrote and published 12 poetry books and anthologies, took part in local and international literary festivals and founded several literary groups and workshops.

Youth Poet Laureate Amina Mohammed grew up in Worcester's Main South neighborhood, the daughter of an immigrant family. Her parents worked long hours to provide for her and her siblings with considerable support from neighbors. Mohammad is the first Youth Poet Laureate in the state of Massachusetts.

Presented by the Worcester Public Library. 
Friday April 15, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Online
 
Saturday, April 16
 

7:00pm EDT

Poetry Month Celebration with Mass. Book Award Poetry Winners
Saturday April 16, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Enjoy a Poetry Month Celebration with local award-winning authors Karen Skolfield, Oliver de la Paz, and Andrea Cohen. The program will feature a reading from each of the poets, followed by a discussion and Q & A. Karen Skolfield will share an excerpt from Battle Dress: Poems, which recently won the Massachusetts Book Award for poetry. Honorees Oliver de la Paz (The Boy in the Labyrinth) and Andrea Cohen (Nightshade) will read from their books.

About the Books:
Battle Dress: Poems by Karen Skolfield: In a poetic voice at once accessible and otherworldly, gutsy and insightful, U.S. Army veteran Karen Skolfield offers a rare glimpse of a female soldier's training and mental conditioning. Through the narratives of a young soldier, her older counterpart, and her fellow soldiers, Skolfield searches for meaning in combat preparation, long-term trauma, and the way war is embedded in our language and psyche.

The Boy in the Labyrinth by Oliver de la Paz: In a long sequence of prose poems, questionnaires, and standardized tests, The Boy in the Labyrinth interrogates the language of autism and the language barriers between parents, their children, and the fractured medium of science and school.

Nightshade by Andrea Cohen: The poems in Andrea Cohen's Nightshade, her sixth full-length collection, are constructed from the wisdom of loss--of lovers and loved ones and a world gone awry. Cohen builds a short poem the way a master carpenter does a tiny house, in lines that are both economic and precise, with room enough for sorrow and wit to exist comfortably in their spaces.

About the Poets:
Karen Skolfield’s book Battle Dress (W. W. Norton) won the 2020 Massachusetts Book Award in poetry and the Barnard Women Poets Prize. Her book Frost in the Low Areas (Zone 3 Press) won the 2014 PEN New England Award in poetry, and she is the winner of the 2016 Jeffrey E. Smith Editors’ Prize in poetry from The Missouri Review. Skolfield is a U.S. Army veteran and teaches writing to engineers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst; she’s the poet laureate for Northampton, MA for 2019-2022. Learn more: https://karenskolfield.com/

Oliver de la Paz is the author of five collections of poetry: Names Above Houses, Furious Lullaby, Requiem for the Orchard, Post Subject: A Fable, and The Boy in the Labyrinth which was a finalist for the Massachusetts Book Award in Poetry. He also co-edited A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry. A founding member, Oliver serves as the cochair of the Kundiman advisory board. He has received grants from the NEA, NYFA, the Artist’s Trust, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and has been awarded two Pushcart Prizes. His work has been published in journals such as Poetry, American Poetry Review, Tin House, The Southern Review, and Poetry Northwest. He teaches at the College of the Holy Cross and in the LowResidency MFA Program at PLU. Learn more: https://www.oliverdelapaz.com/

Andrea Cohen's poems have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, The Threepenny Review, and elsewhere. Her seventh poetry collection, Everything, was recently published by Four Way Books. Other recent books include Nightshade and Unfathoming. Cohen directs the Blacksmith House Poetry Series in Cambridge, MA. Learn more: https://www.andreacohen.org/

This event is sponsored by the Billerica Public Library Foundation.
Presented in collaboration with libraries in Tewksbury, North Reading, and Chelmsford.
Saturday April 16, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Microphone
Saturday April 16, 2022 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
TBA
Bruce Weigl is the author, editor or translator of over thirty books of poetry, poetry in translation, critical essays, and prose. His most recent poetry collection, On the Shores of Welcome Home, won the Isabella Gardner Poetry Award and was published by BOA Editions, Ltd. in 2019. This year BOA will also publish a collection of his short prose, Among Elms, in Ambush, and the Writers Association Publishing house in Ha Noi, Vietnam will publish his co-translation of Slaughterhouse, a book-length poem by Nguyen Quang Thieu, one of Vietnam’s most important writers.

Cammy Thomas’ first book, Cathedral of Wish, received the Norma Farber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America. A fellowship from the Ragdale Foundation helped her complete Inscriptions. Her third collection, Tremors, is forthcoming in 2021. All are published by Four Way Books. Her work appeared recently in the anthology, Poems in the Aftermath. Two of her poems under the title Far Past War were set to music by her sister, composer Augusta Read Thomas. The work will premiere in 2022. Cammy lives in Lexington, Massachusetts.

To sign up for this Zoom reading, contact hguran@aol.com
Saturday April 16, 2022 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Tuesday, April 19
 

1:00pm EDT

Signs of Your True Voice: First Words, Breakthroughs, Trust, and Transformation with Brenda Shaughnessy
Tuesday April 19, 2022 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
As writers and poets, we often wonder: who is this porous and gullible and hungry person writing my poems, who is feeding her and is she for real? Is it truly me who wrote this? Is that my story, my voice? Why don’t I sound like myself—or worse, why does my self sound…not quite right? These questions can be painful, discouraging, silencing. Let’s move beyond them and go deeper into the real mysteries, the useful ones, the ones that help us write and propel us further into our journey as writers. We’ll look at why some “first words” last, what trusting your voice means, and how inchoate feelings can be transformed into art.

Brenda Shaughnessy is the author of five poetry books, including The Octopus Museum (Knopf 2019), a New York Times Notable Book. A new collection, Tanya, is forthcoming in 2023, and Liquid Flesh: New and Selected Poems will appear in the UK from Bloodaxe (Fall 2022). Recipient of a 2018 Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a 2013 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, she is Professor of English at Rutgers University-Newark. 

Harvard University welcomes individuals with disabilities to participate in its programs and activities. If you would like to request accommodations or have questions about the digital access provided, please contact Ariella Ruth Goldberg, at agoldberg@hds.harvard.edu or 617-495-4476 in advance of your participation.
Tuesday April 19, 2022 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
Online

3:00pm EDT

Concord Poetry at the Library Series presents: Andrea Cohen / Fady Joudah
Tuesday April 19, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Join acclaimed poets Andrea Cohen and Fady Joudah reading from recent work and talking about their practice.

Andrea Cohen reads from Everything (Four Way Books, 2021) – poems that traffic in wonder and woe, in dialogue and interior speculation. Humor and gravity go hand in hand here. “A work of great and sustained attention, true intelligence, and soul,” praises Christian Wiman.  Cohen’s poems and stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, The Threepenny Review, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, and elsewhere. Her other collections include Nightshade (Four Way, 2019), winner of the 2020 American Fiction Book Award for Contemporary Poetry, Unfathoming (Four Way, 2017), Furs Not Mine (Four Way, 2015), Kentucky Derby (Salmon Poetry, 2011), Long Division (Salmon Poetry, 2009), and The Cartographer's Vacation (Owl Creek Press, 1999). Cohen has received a PEN Discovery Award, Glimmer Train's Short Fiction Award, and several fellowships at The MacDowell Colony. She directs the Blacksmith House Poetry Series in Cambridge, MA.

Fady Joudah reads from Tethered to Stars (Milkweek Editions, 2021.) With an analytical eye and a lyrical heart, Joudah shifts deftly between the microscope, the telescope, and sometimes even the horoscope. His gaze lingers on the interior space of a lung, on a butterfly poised on a filament, on the moon temple atop Huayna Picchu, on a dismembered live oak. In each lingering, Joudah shares with readers the palimpsest of what makes us human. Joudah’s other collections include Footnotes in the Order of Disappearance (Milkweed Editions, 2018), Textu (Copper Canyon Press, 2013), Alight (Copper Canyon, 2013), and The Earth in the Attic (Yale University Press, 2008.) He has translated several collections of poetry from the Arabic and is the co-editor and co-founder of the Etel Adnan Poetry Prize. He was a winner of the Yale Series of Younger Poets competition in 2007 and has received a PEN award, a Banipal/Times Literary Supplement prize from the UK, the Griffin Poetry Prize, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He lives in Houston, with his wife and kids, where he practices internal medicine.
Speakers

Tuesday April 19, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online

3:00pm EDT

The Cambridge Poetry MashUp Presents: The Poetry of Toni Morrison, a Workshop with The New England Poetry Club
Tuesday April 19, 2022 3:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
TBA
YOU ARE INVITED to: The Cambridge Poetry MashUp in April 2021, a National Poetry Month celebration. The series of events will celebrate the poetic and cultural diversity of poets who live in Cambridge, MA & its neighboring cities. Artists from other states will join us. Poetry, Song, and Storytelling shall abound.

Join us on April 18th for a workshop on the Poetry of Toni Morrison, with The New England Poetry Club. Details forthcoming.

https://www.poetrymashup.org/
Tuesday April 19, 2022 3:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
TBA

4:30pm EDT

Miriam Levine Reading - Featuring Enzo Silon Surin
Tuesday April 19, 2022 4:30pm - 6:00pm EDT
The FSU English Department is excited to invite back to campus our talented alumnus, Enzo Silon Surin '00! Enzo is a Haitian-born award-winning writer, poet, educator, publisher, and social advocate. He is the author of three collections of poetry, including When My Body Was A Clinched Fist (Black Lawrence Press, 2020), winner of the 21st Annual Massachusetts Book Award for Poetry, and the chapbook, A Letter of Resignation: An American Libretto (Central Square Press, 2017), as well as the co-editor of Where We Stand: Poems of Black Resilience (Cherry Castle Publishing, 2022). Enzo’s work gives voice to experiences that take place in what he calls “broken spaces.” Co-sponsored by the Framingham State University English Department, Office of Development & Alumni Relations and Center for Inclusive Excellence, this year’s Miriam Levine reading, a free event, is made possible in part through a grant from the University’s Council on Diversity and Inclusion. Please visit the event website for further information, including reservations and parking information.
Speakers
Tuesday April 19, 2022 4:30pm - 6:00pm EDT
Framingham State University, Heineman Ecumenical Center
 
Wednesday, April 20
 

12:30pm EDT

April Grubby Desk Lunch
Wednesday April 20, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EDT
Looking for some virtual mid-week writing community? Or do you have a little time during your lunch break for a chat and guided writing? Join our FREE Grubby Desk Lunch Series live via easy-to-use video conferencing. Join us on Wednesday, April 20th, from 12:30pm-1:15pm. For 45 minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some cool writing exercises.

Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your day and beyond. Please make sure to register ahead so we can email you a link to join! You can expect an email on April 20th around 12:15pm.
Speakers
Wednesday April 20, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EDT
Online

5:30pm EDT

Summer 2022 Virtual Open House & Info Session
Wednesday April 20, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Love to write but don't have anywhere to get feedback on your work? Want to meet fellow writers and work under the guidance of published authors? GrubStreet is here to help!

On Wednesday, April 20th from 5:30pm-6:30pm, we will be hosting a Virtual Open House to talk about upcoming Summer 2022 classes, GrubStreet's membership program, GrubStreet's Boston Writers of Color Group, and more!

In this webinar-style session, a panel of our staff members will give you an overview of GrubStreet and who we are, and we'll dive into everything coming up at GrubStreet next term. At the end, there will be some time set aside for a Q+A of follow-up questions.

We'll answer any questions that we feel would apply to lots of attendees in the session, and for any questions that are specific to you and your writing, we'll send a personalized email back to you! We welcome all questions about all things GrubStreet.

Please make sure to pre-register, so we can email you the link to join the meeting! We'll also send all attendees a code to receive 10% off any Summer 2022 class.
Wednesday April 20, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

Hybrid Reading Series: Rebecca Kaiser Gibson and Fred Marchant
Wednesday April 20, 2022 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Please join us for our reading with Rebecca Kaiser Gibson and Fred Merchant. 

Please provide proof of vaccination at the door. Masks are required for the duration of the event.

To register to attend on Zoom, go here: http://events.r20.constantcontact.com/register/event?oeidk=a07ej31qnr71575a7af&llr=6hztvkcab
Wednesday April 20, 2022 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Grolier Poetry Bookshop Plympton Street Cambridge
 
Thursday, April 21
 

7:00pm EDT

Kemi Alabi, author of Against Heaven, with Porsha Olayiwola
Thursday April 21, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Porter Square Books is delighted to welcome Kemi Alabi for Against Heaven, called "a stunning debut from one of our most talented emerging voices". Joined in conversation by poet laureate for the city of Boston Porsha Olayiwola, Alabi will discuss magic, portals, spells, and altered states in their poetry. This event is free and open to all, hosted virtually via Crowdcast on Thursday, April 21 at 7pm.
Winner of the Academy of American Poets First Book Award, selected by Claudia Rankine.

Kemi Alabi’s transcendent debut reimagines the poetic and cultural traditions from which it is born, troubling the waters of some of our country’s central and ordained fictions—those mythic politics of respectability, resilience, and redemption. Instead of turning to a salvation that has been forced upon them, Alabi turns to the body and the earth as sites of paradise defined by the pleasure and possibility of Black, queer fugitivity. Through tender love poems, righteous prayers, and vital provocations, we see the colonizers we carry within ourselves being laid to rest.

Thursday April 21, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA

7:00pm EDT

Changeable Gods - Richard Wollman - Book Launch
Thursday April 21, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Please join the Department of Literature & Writing and Sidelines Magazine to celebrate the book launch of Changeable Gods, Richard Wollman's new poetry collection, winner of the Elyse Wolf Prize from Slate Roof Press. There will be an introduction by Alfred Nicol, Q&A, and wine and hors d'oeuvres after the reading.

This event will be both in-person and on Zoom.
Speakers
Thursday April 21, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Trustman Gallery Simmons College
 
Saturday, April 23
 

12:00pm EDT

2022 Bishop/Knight College Poetry Contest Reading
Saturday April 23, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
TBA
Join us on Saturday, April 23, 2022, at noon for the 2022 installment of our annual College Poetry Contest where we will award the Elizabeth Manuscript Prize and the Etheridge Knight Performance Prize. In its fourteenth year, area colleges send representatives to compete for bragging rights, complimentary membership in the WCPA, cash prizes, and the publication of a poem by the manuscript winner in “The Worcester Review“.

Our 2022 event will be held via Zoom. Visit the Zoom registration link to receive information on how to join the reading. Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and a link to join.

Moderators
Saturday April 23, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
TBA

6:00pm EDT

NBF Presents: Poetry in Protest
Saturday April 23, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
It’s National Poetry Month, and to celebrate, National Book Award–honored authors Toi Derricotte (“I”: New and Selected Poems), Camonghne Felix (Build Yourself a Boat), and Terrance Hayes (American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin) discuss the impact of protest poetry on American literature and American politics with Kyle Dacuyan, Executive Director of the Poetry Project.
Saturday April 23, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, April 24
 

5:30pm EDT

Free Happy Hour Writing Session - Remote
Sunday April 24, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
What's more satisfying than leaving work behind on a Friday afternoon? Rounding out the week with a free writing session, of course! Maximize that Friday feeling and kick off your writing weekend. Leave work behind on Friday, April 23rd, from 5:30pm-6:30pm, grab a snack and/or your favorite after-work beverage, and log into GrubStreet Remote for some writing! In 60 jam-packed minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some great writing exercises.

Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your evening and beyond. Please make sure to register ahead so we can email you a link to join!
Speakers
Sunday April 24, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, April 25
 

3:00pm EDT

The Cambridge Poetry MashUp Presents: Poets in the Garden
Monday April 25, 2022 3:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
TBA
YOU ARE INVITED to: The Cambridge Poetry MashUp in April 2021, a National Poetry Month celebration. The series of events will celebrate the poetic and cultural diversity of poets who live in Cambridge, MA & its neighboring cities. Artists from other states will join us. Poetry, Song, and Storytelling shall abound.

Join us on April 24th for Poets in the Garden. Details forthcoming.

https://www.poetrymashup.org/


Monday April 25, 2022 3:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
TBA
 
Tuesday, April 26
 

3:00pm EDT

Tuning in to a higher power: poems of prayer
Tuesday April 26, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Poetry, like all of the arts, helps raise heavy hearts, and who doesn’t need more of that right now? Join us to listen and/or share poetry about the uplifting power of Love. For more information, go to christianscience.com/tmcrrnow

Attendees are encouraged to share favorite poems and original works about God’s goodness and care for us.
Tuesday April 26, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

A virtual Thirsty Lab with Joe Fusco Jr.
Tuesday April 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
The Thirsty Lab poetry reading, normally based out of Princeton, Mass., continues to meet virtually. On Tuesday, March 29, 2022, Joe Fusco Jr. will be the featured reader.

Visit the Zoom registration link to receive information on how to join the reading. Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and a link to join.

Joe Fusco Jr. is a well-seasoned poet and humorist from Worcester, Massachusetts. He is the author of four books of semi-amusing poems and essays: Pondering the Pandemic During the Rust Years (2021); Hmm…That’s Different (2020); Three Score (2014); and The Lost and Found Essays (2012), all available on Amazon. Joe’s musings have appeared in Damfino PressBallard Street PoetryWorcester ReviewAsinine Poetry, and the naughty ezine Clean Sheets. He was a co-winner of the Jacob Knight Poetry Award in 2002 and was named Best Poet by Worcester Magazine readers in 1999 and 2002. Joe is still a frequent contributor to Worcester Magazine and the last Worcester Mega-Slam winner in 2017. Joe has lived in lovely Worcester with his better half Cyndi and their large family for thirty-five years. He is a registered Independent and sleeps with one eye always open. More info on Joe can be found at joesyellowpad.com.
Moderators Speakers

Tuesday April 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA

7:00pm EDT

April U35-U18
Tuesday April 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
To kick off our poetry programming at GrubStreet's new Center for Creative Writing, and in honor of National Poetry Month, we are bringing some of Boston's best youth voices to the Seaport for a night of words and music. You won't want to miss this one-of-a-kind, U35 through U18 extravaganza!
Tuesday April 26, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
GrubStreet's Center for Creative Writing
 
Thursday, April 28
 

5:00pm EDT

Robert M. Gay Memorial Lecture — Poetry Reading with Martín Espada
Thursday April 28, 2022 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Martín Espada, winner of the 2021 National Book Award for Poetry, will read from Floaters, his remarkable book. Cyrus Cassells: "...Espada is a fierce activist in verse, decrying, with accuracy and urgency, the depravity of inhumane detention and acute bigotry. One of America's most indelible voices, as always, Espada's poetry is lionhearted."

This event will be both in-person and on Zoom.
Thursday April 28, 2022 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Linda K. Paresky Conference Center at Simmons University
 
Friday, April 29
 

5:30pm EDT

Read and Write PoeTREE with Fay Ferency, Jess Rizkallah, and Letta Neely
Friday April 29, 2022 5:30pm - 7:00pm EDT
Join writers Fay Ferency, Jess Rizkallah, and Letta Neely as they read aloud their nature and tree-centered poetry and guide participants in a brief poetry writing workshop. Participants will then have the opportunity to head outdoors, craft their own tree-inspired poetry, and share their creations with the rest of the group, all alongside the assistance of the writers. Registration requested, but walk-ups are welcome.

This event is brought to you in partnership with Boston Seaport by WS Development.
Friday April 29, 2022 5:30pm - 7:00pm EDT
111 Harbor Way
 
Saturday, April 30
 

1:00pm EDT

Soul: An Ancestor Workshop w/ Marlanda Dekine
Saturday April 30, 2022 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Led by poet and Castle of our Skins’ Shirley Graham Du Bois Creative in Residence Marlanda Dekine, this participatory workshop will use writing and meditation to consider how our individual origin stories and ancestries influence our being.

Speakers
Saturday April 30, 2022 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Arnold Arboretum
 
Sunday, May 1
 

1:00pm EDT

Book Launch Party for Kate Hanson Foster's New Book of Poems, Crow Funeral
Sunday May 1, 2022 1:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Join us for an afternoon of poetry and music as we celebrate the launch of Kate Hanson Foster's recently released book of poems, Crow Funeral, as well as new work by Matt W. Miller, Todd Hearon, and Michael Kleber-Diggs.

Kate Hanson Foster is the author of Mid Drift, a finalist for the Massachusetts Center for the Book Award. Her writing has appeared in Birmingham Poetry Review, Comstock Review, Harpur Palate, Poet Lore, Salamander, Tupelo Quarterly, and elsewhere. A recipient of the NEA Parent Fellowship through the Vermont Studio Center, she lives and writes in Groton, Massachusetts.

Matt W. Miller was born and raised in Lowell, Massachusetts. He is the author of Tender the River (Texas Review Press), The Wounded for the Water (Salmon Poetry) , Club Icarus (University of North Texas Press), selected by Major Jackson as the 2012 Vassar Miller Poetry Prize winner, and Cameo Diner: Poems (Loom). He has published work previously in Slate, Harvard Review, Notre Dame Review, Southwest Review, Southeast Review, Florida Review, Third Coast, The Rumpus, Poetry Daily, and other journals. He teaches English and coaches football at Phillips Exeter Academy where he also co-directs the Writers’ Workshop at Exeter.

Award-winning poet, playwright and songwriter, Todd Hearon is the author of three collections of poems—Strange Land (Southern Illinois University Press, 2010), No Other Gods (Salmon Poetry, 2015) and Crows in Eden (Salmon, 2022)—a novella, DO GEESE SEE GOD (Neutral Zones Press, 2021), and the studio album, Border Radio, which was listed as “Best Music of the Seacoast” in 2021. His poems, essays and plays have appeared widely in this country and abroad. He is the recipient of a PEN/New England “Discovery” Award, the Friends of Literature Prize (Poetry magazine and the Poetry Foundation), the Rumi Prize in Poetry (Arts & Letters), and the Campbell Corner Poetry Prize (Sarah Lawrence College). Born in Texas and raised in North Carolina, he lives in Exeter, New Hampshire, and teaches at Phillips Exeter Academy.

Michael Kleber-Diggs (KLEE-burr digs) (he / him / his) is a poet, essayist, literary critic, and arts educator. His debut poetry collection, Worldly Things (Milkweed Editions 2021), won the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize, the 2022 Hefner Heitz Kansas Book Award in Poetry, and is a finalist for the 2022 Minnesota Book Award. His poems and essays appear in numerous journals and anthologies. Michael is married to Karen Kleber-Diggs, a tropical horticulturist and orchid specialist. Karen and Michael have a daughter who is pursuing a BFA in Dance Performance at SUNY Purchase.
Sunday May 1, 2022 1:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
56 Island Street, Lawrence, MA
 
Monday, May 2
 

TBA

The Cambridge Poetry MashUp Presents: Future Leaders Read - youth & teen poetry
Monday May 2, 2022 TBA
TBA
YOU ARE INVITED to: The Cambridge Poetry MashUp in April 2021, a National Poetry Month celebration. The series of events will celebrate the poetic and cultural diversity of poets who live in Cambridge, MA & its neighboring cities. Artists from other states will join us. Poetry, Song, and Storytelling shall abound.

Join us on May 1st for Future Leaders Read: youth & teen poetry. Details forthcoming.

https://www.poetrymashup.org/


Monday May 2, 2022 TBA
TBA

5:00pm EDT

A Reading With Martín Espada
Monday May 2, 2022 5:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Please join us for this reading, and help us launch the new paperback edition of Floaters.
Speakers
Monday May 2, 2022 5:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Old Chapel, University of Massachusetts Amherst

7:00pm EDT

The Book of Delights with Ross Gay
Monday May 2, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
In The Book of Delights, one of today’s most original literary voices offers up a genre-defying volume of lyric essays written over one tumultuous year. The first nonfiction book from award-winning poet Ross Gay is a record of the small joys we often overlook in our busy lives. Among Gay’s funny, poetic, philosophical delights: a friend’s unabashed use of air quotes, cradling a tomato seedling aboard an airplane, the silent nod of acknowledgment between the only two black people in a room. But Gay never dismisses the complexities, even the terrors, of living in America as a black man or the ecological and psychic violence of our consumer culture or the loss of those he loves. More than anything else, though, Gay celebrates the beauty of the natural world–his garden, the flowers peeking out of the sidewalk, the hypnotic movements of a praying mantis.

Ross Gay is the author of four books of poetry: Against WhichBringing the Shovel DownBe Holding; and Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. His new poem, Be Holding, was released from the University of Pittsburgh Press in September of 2020. His collection of essays, The Book of Delights, was released by Algonquin Books in 2019. Ross is also the co-author, with Aimee Nezhukumatathil, of the chapbook “Lace and Pyrite: Letters from Two Gardens,” in addition to being co-author, with Rosechard Wehrenberg, of the chapbook, “River.”  Ross is a founding board member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a non-profit, free-fruit-for-all food justice and joy project. He also works on The Tenderness Project with Shayla Lawson and Essence London. He has received fellowships from Cave Canem, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and the Guggenheim Foundation. Ross teaches at Indiana University.
Speakers
Monday May 2, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, May 3
 

7:00pm EDT

Joint Reading with Jeffrey Yang with Fanny Howe
Tuesday May 3, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Porter Square Books is thrilled to partner with Mass Poetry in welcoming Jeffrey Yang and Fanny Howe for a reading and conversation about the poets' latest works! Hear from Line and Light, a multifaceted collection by Jeffrey Yang, whose poetry is “flexible, expansive, sonorously clever” (The Millions), and Indivisible, the conclusion of a radically philosophical and personal series of Fanny Howe novels animated by questions of race, spirituality, childhood, transience, resistance, and poverty.
Tuesday May 3, 2022 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
GrubStreet Center for Creative Writing
 
Wednesday, May 4
 

12:00pm EDT

“There is a hornet in the room”: A Craft Talk and Poetry Reading About Insects with Robyn Schiff
Wednesday May 4, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
“There is a hornet in the room,” a line drawn from a poem by James Schuyler, will be a talk about a few poems that involve insects, followed by a reading from Robyn Schiff's insect-infested manuscript-in-progress, Information Desk: An Epic. Robyn Schiff is the author of three books of poems, Worth, Revolver, and A Woman of Property. A winner of the Rome Prize, she is a Professor at Emory University, and co-editor of Canarium Books. Schiff’s next collection, Information Desk: An Epic, is forthcoming from Penguin. Harvard University welcomes individuals with disabilities to participate in its programs and activities.

This event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. If you would like to request accommodations or have questions about the digital access provided, please contact Ariella Ruth Goldberg, at agoldberg@hds.harvard.edu or 617-495-4476 in advance of your participation.
Speakers
Wednesday May 4, 2022 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, May 6
 

12:30pm EDT

Brown Bag Lunch Session - Remote
Friday May 6, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EDT
Looking for some virtual mid-week writing community? Or do you have a schedule that gives you free afternoons instead of evenings? Join our FREE Brown Bag Lunch Writing Series live via easy to use video conferencing. Join us on Wednesday, May 5th from 12:30pm-1:15pm. For 45 minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some cool writing exercises. Led by one of our award-winning instructors or ambassadors.

Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your day and beyond. Please make sure to register ahead so we can email you a link to join!
Speakers
Friday May 6, 2022 12:30pm - 1:15pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, May 17
 

3:00pm EDT

Concord Poetry at the Library Series presents: Krysten Hill and Cynthia Manick, A reading and conversation with Joyce Peseroff
Tuesday May 17, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The Concord Poetry at the Library Series is proud to present award-winning poets Krysten Hill and Cynthia Manick who will read from their poetry collections and in conversation with poet and editor Joyce Peseroff talk about their inspirations, influences, and the act of writing.

Krysten Hill (Photo Credit: Jonathan Beckley) is the author of How Her Spirit Got Out (Aforementioned Productions, 2016), which received the 2017 Jean Pedrick Chapbook Prize from the New England Poetry Club. Her work has been featured in The Academy of American Poets, apt, B O D Y, Boiler Magazine, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Muzzle, PANK,Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Winter Tangerine Review and elsewhere. The recipient of the 2016 St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist Award and 2020 Mass Cultural Council Poetry Fellowship, she received her MFA in poetry from University of Massachusetts Boston, where she currently teaches.  

Cynthia Manick (Photo Credit: Sue Rissberger) is the author of Blue Hallelujahs (Black Lawrence Press, 2016) and editor of Soul Sister Revue: A Poetry Compilation (Jamii Publishing, 2019) and The Future of Black: Afrofuturism and Black Comics Poetry (Blair Publishing, forthcoming 2021). She has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Hedgebrook, MacDowell Colony, and Château de la Napoule among others. Winner of the Lascaux Prize in Collected Poetry, Manick was also awarded Honorable Mention for the 2019 Furious Flower Poetry Prize. She is Founder of the reading series Soul Sister Revue; and her poem "Things I Carry Into the World" was made into a film by Motionpoems, an organization dedicated to video poetry, and has debuted on Tidal for National Poetry Month. A performer at literary festivals, libraries, universities, and most recently the Brooklyn Museum, Manick’s work has appeared in the Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day Series, Callaloo, Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB), The Wall Street Journal, and elsewhereShe currently serves on the board of the International Women’s Writing Guild and the editorial board of Alice James Books.

Joyce Peseroff’s most recent, sixth poetry collection is Petition (Carnegie Mellon University Press, Fall, 2020.) She edited Robert Bly: When Sleepers Awake, The Ploughshares Poetry Reader, and Simply Lasting: Writers on Jane Kenyon. Her fifth book of poems, Know Thyself, was designated a “must read” by the 2016 Massachusetts Book Award. Recent poems and reviews appear in American Journal of Poetry, Consequence, On the Seawall, Massachusetts Review, Plume, Salamander, and on the website The Woven Tale Press. Her honors include grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Massachusetts Artists Foundation as well as a Pushcart Prize. She directed and taught in UMass Boston’s MFA Program in its first four years. Currently she blogs for her website and writes a poetry column for Arrowsmith Press.

Sponsored by The Friends of the Concord Free Public Library in Concord, Massachusetts
Speakers

Tuesday May 17, 2022 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, May 25
 

6:30pm EDT

Amesbury Poetry Series
Wednesday May 25, 2022 6:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Featured poetry reading followed by an open mic. Jason Tandon is the author of five books of poetry, including This Far North (Black Lawrence Press, forthcoming 2023) and The Actual World (Black Lawrence Press, 2019). His poems have appeared in Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, Beloit Poetry Journal, North American Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. He teaches in the Arts & Sciences Writing Program at Boston University.
Speakers
Wednesday May 25, 2022 6:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
John Greenleaf Whittier Home & Museum
 
Friday, May 27
 

6:00pm EDT

Reading and Reception with Marie Gauthier
Friday May 27, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Celebrate with us! Shelburne Falls resident Marie Gauthier's debut book of poetry, "Leave No Wake" was just published by Pine Row Press. Please join us on Friday, May 27th, at 6:00PM for a reading by Marie, followed by a reception, here at the Arms Library. We will be in the upstairs reading room. The Arms is accessible via the lower level entrance out back. Vaxxed and masked, please!

Marie Gauthier’s first full-length collection, Leave No Wake, was published by Pine Row Press in April. She's also the author of the chapbook Hunger All Inside (Finishing Line Press). Her poems have appeared in Poetry Northwest, Sugar House Review, The West Review, and elsewhere. She was the recipient of a 2008 Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Prize, and received Honorable Mention in the 2010 Dorothy Prizes. She works for Pioneer Valley Books as the marketing project editor, and runs the Collected Poets Series in Shelburne Falls, Mass., where she lives with her family. She serves as the founding president of the League of Women Voters of Franklin County in addition to her work on the board of the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts.

Books will be available, and you can also purchase ahead of time here: https://amzn.to/3MPw3OT.

Registration not necessary!
Exhibitors
Friday May 27, 2022 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Arms Library
 
Tuesday, May 31
 

2:00pm EDT

Book Discussion with Author and Poet Jennifer Freed
Tuesday May 31, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Join author Jennifer Freed for an informal discussion of her new book, When Light Shifts. In a sequence of story-poems, Freed’s memoir describes the period following her mother’s stroke from multiple perspectives, touching on themes of identity, healthcare, healing, and parenting one’s parents. Copies of her book are available to check out at the Gale Free Library. To register, please call (508)210-5569, or email galefreelibrary@gmail.com

Jennifer Freed is an author, poet and teacher, and has been leading the Gale Free Library’s monthly “Craft of Writing” programs since 2014. She was a finalist in the 2013 New Women's Voices Competition, and was awarded the 2020 Samuel Washington Allen Prize for a long poem or poem-sequence. Jennifer has also been a finalist for the Frank O'Hara prize multiple times, and has received multiple nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Orison Anthology.
Speakers
Tuesday May 31, 2022 2:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, June 1
 

6:30pm EDT

Teen Summer Virtual Open House & Info Session
Wednesday June 1, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
GrubStreet's teen summer writing classes give writers aged 13-18 the opportunity to explore all different types of genres, topics, and styles of creative writing in the company of other teens who love words—written and spoken. On June 1st from 6:30-7:30pm, join us for a Teen Summer Virtual Open House & Info Session to learn more about GrubStreet’s teen summer classes, our instructors, scholarships, what the online and in-person class experience will look like, and a chance to win a kit full of creative fun!

In this webinar-style session, a panel of our staff members will give you an overview of GrubStreet’s Young Adult Writers Program. Teens will then have a chance to chat with a few of our summer instructors. At the end, there will be some time set aside for a Q&A.

For any questions that are specific to you and your writing, please email us and we'll send a personalized response! We welcome all questions about all things related to YAWP and GrubStreet.

Please make sure to pre-register, so we can email you the link to join the meeting! To support your continued investment in your creative writing, all teen attendees will be gifted a 10% discount for any one Teen Summer 2022 class.
Wednesday June 1, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, June 6
 

2:30pm EDT

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Monday June 6, 2022 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday June 6, 2022 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, June 10
 

5:30pm EDT

June Friday Night Writes
Friday June 10, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
What's more satisfying than leaving work behind on a Friday evening? Rounding out the week with a free virtual writing session, of course! Maximize that Friday night feeling and kick off your writing weekend with us online! Join us for a Friday Night Writes Session on Friday, June 10th, from 5:30pm-6:30pm and log into GrubStreet Remote for some writing! In 60 jam-packed minutes, you’ll meet fellow writers and get your creative juices flowing with some great writing exercises. Best of all, you’ll sign off with some new ideas to ponder for the rest of your evening and beyond. Please make sure to register in advance so we can email you a link to join!

A multidisciplinary award-winning writer of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry, Rolando-André López is currently pursuing a Creative Writing MFA at California College of the Arts in San Francisco, CA. In 2020, he was a 1st Place Voices of Color Fellow at Martha's Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing, and his essay, "ya tú sa'e," was a finalist for the Ray Ventre nonfiction prize at Passages North Literary Journal. A performer as well, he read for the Mayor's Office of Arts and Culture in Boston, after his poem, "wealth," was selected by Porsha Olayiwola for its representation of Afrofuturism. In 2021, he was awarded a Winter/Spring 2022 Fellowship at Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art. His work has been featured in Orca Literary Journal, America Magazine, Sacred Trespasses, The Coffin Bell Journal, and Bellow Literary Journal.
Speakers
Friday June 10, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, June 12
 

3:00pm EDT

Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site & New England Poetry Club
Magdalena Gómez is the Poet Laureate of Springfield, MA and a Poetry Fellow of the Academy of American Poets. Her poetry collection, Shameless Woman, (Red Sugarcane Press, NYC) is studied in Latinx curricula throughout the U.S. Her ground-breaking memoir noir, M’ija, will be released in hardcover in spring of 2022 by Heliotrope Books, NYC.

Enzo Silon Surin is a Haitian-born award-winning poet, educator, publisher and social advocate. He is the author of three collections of poetry, including When My Body Was A Clinched Fist (Black Lawrence Press, 2020) and A Letter of Resignation: An American Libretto (2017). He is Founding Editor and Publisher at Central Square Press and President/Executive Director at the Faraday Publishing Company, Inc. The Longfellow Summer Festival brings music, poetry, and community to the East Lawn of the Longfellow House on Sunday afternoons through the summer.

The 2022 Summer Festival will kick off on Sunday, June 5. All events are free and open to the public. Just bring a picnic blanket or lawn chair! The series is co-sponsored by the Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters and the New England Poetry Club.
 
Saturday, June 18
 

7:30pm EDT

Her Voice Among the Aisles: A Celebration of Emily Dickinson through Poetry & Song
Saturday June 18, 2022 7:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Emily Dickinson is largely considered one of the leading poetic voices of the 19th century. Her words have inspired many composers who have set her words to music. Annina Hsieh (soprano) and Judy Park (piano) will perform selections from Aaron Copland’s playful, tragic, personal, perennial, and ethereal song cycle Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson, as well as settings of Dickinson’s verse by other American composers. Poets Tom Daley and Cammy Thomas will recite and provide insights into the power, nuance, and beauty of Dickinson’s poetic vision.

Annina Hsieh is a Boston-based soprano and educator. Praised for her sensitivity as a performer, Hsieh strives to connect with audiences in opera and recital settings, and was the 2019 winner of the Handel and Haydn Society’s Barbara E. Maze Award for Musical Excellence. She completed her Master of Music in Voice Performance at Cleveland Institute of Music, and her Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance at Ithaca College.

Leona Cheung is a Boston-based collaborative pianist. Her deep devotion to Art Song repertoire has brought her to perform in the Oxford Lieder Festival, Leeds Lieder Festival, Toronto Summer Music Festival, Franz Schubert Institut and Songfest. She earned her Master of Music and Graduate Diploma in Collaborative Piano from New England Conservatory, and a Bachelor of Music degree in Piano Performance from Hong Kong Baptist University.

Tom Daley is the author of the play Every Broom and Bridget—Emily Dickinson and Her Irish Servants. Tom leads workshops in poetry and in memoir writing at Lexington Community Education and elsewhere. Recipient of the Dana Award in Poetry his poetry has appeared in Harvard Review, Massachusetts Review, 32 Poems, Fence, Denver Quarterly, Crazyhorse, Barrow Street, Rhino, Prairie Schooner, Witness, and Poetry Ireland Review. Regarding his poetry collection House You Cannot Reach, Lloyd Schwartz writes, "Every line here, even—and maybe especially—in the poignant poems “spoken” by the poet’s mother, radiates his love of poetry."

Cammy Thomas’ first book of poems, Cathedral of Wish, received the 2006 Norma Farber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America. A fellowship from the Ragdale Foundation helped her complete her second book, Inscriptions. Her third book, Tremors, came out in 2021. Her poems have recently appeared in Amsterdam Quarterly, The Poetry Porch, New Orleans Review, and Poet Lore. Far Past War, a choral setting of her poems composed by her sister, Augusta Read Thomas, premiered at Washington’s National Cathedral on March 13, 2022. She lives in Bolton, MA.
Saturday June 18, 2022 7:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Follen Church Society
 
Sunday, June 19
 

6:30pm EDT

Lesley University MFA in Creative Writing Summer Reading Series
Sunday June 19, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Lesley University’s Graduate Creative Writing summer evening reading series will bring acclaimed authors to campus from June 17-25. All readings will take place on the South Campus in Washburn Auditorium. Attendance at the in-person readings is restricted to members of the Lesley Community (students, faculty, staff) due to Covid-19 restrictions. All readings will be open to the public on Zoom, all times are ET. Award-winning author Angie Cruz will headline the series as a visiting author.
Sunday June 19, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, June 20
 

6:30pm EDT

Lesley University MFA in Creative Writing Summer Reading Series
Monday June 20, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Lesley University’s Graduate Creative Writing summer evening reading series will bring acclaimed authors to campus from June 17-25. All readings will take place on the South Campus in Washburn Auditorium. Attendance at the in-person readings is restricted to members of the Lesley Community (students, faculty, staff) due to Covid-19 restrictions. All readings will be open to the public on Zoom, all times are ET. Award-winning author Angie Cruz will headline the series as a visiting author.
Monday June 20, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, June 22
 

5:00pm EDT

Memorial Poetry Reading for the Late Joan Erickson
Wednesday June 22, 2022 5:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
Please join us for this special memorial poetry reading to honor the late Joan Erickson (1937-2021), a talented artist and beloved poet in the Worcester area poetry community who suddenly passed away last year in May. Poets and friends scheduled to read examples of Joan’s wonderful slice-of-life poetry (which often chronicled the people and everyday events in her life) as well as share some of their own favorite memories of her include Eve Rifkah, Glenn D'Alessio, Tom Ewart, Paul Szlosek, Susan Roney-O’Brien, Nancy Nowak, and Peggy O’Connell, with more to be announced.

The event will be hosted by poet Paul Szlosek, and light refreshments will be served.

For more infomations contact Paul Szlosek at poetsparlor@hotmail.com.

Click Here to Read poems by Joan Erickson and Paul Szlosek.


Wednesday June 22, 2022 5:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
Tidepool Bookshop, Llc
 
Saturday, June 25
 

6:00pm EDT

The Hard Work of Hope Reading
Saturday June 25, 2022 6:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Shortly after COVID-19’s arrival, Mass Poetry put out a call for poems about this unprecedented moment—empty grocery store shelves, conversations across balconies, stadiums turned hospitals, civil resistance in the face of police violence, the sirens, the sirens, the sirens—and were met with an overwhelming response. Using Kathleen Aguero's potem "Hard Work" as a guide, our community rose to the challenge, helping us make a record of this pandemic life. 
We always intended to have a culminating reading, but as the weeks became months, then years, and still case numbers rise and fall, rise again—well, we're realizing there isn't going to be as clear an ending as we'd hoped. So instead we're inviting you to a kick-off celebration: a reading to mark the beginning of a year of dreaming, planning, and creating. We will host a huge community gathering at the Mass Poetry Festival in Spring 2023, and everyone who has participated (as poet, or reader) in "The Hard Work of Hope" is invited to attend. 
But for now, join us on the Summer Solstice, June 21, 2022, to celebrate the balance between light and dark, a tip, a turn toward sun and summer, and beginning again:
6:00 pm - Community gathering near the harbor
6:30 pm - Choral reading of a poem
7:00 pm - Reading on the Calderwood Stage at GrubStreet's Center for Creative Writing
Come for some, or all of the evening. For the inside portion (beginning at 7), masks will be required.
Making sure our events are accessible is a top priority: GrubStreet's building, restrooms, and the event space are wheelchair accessible. There is a hearing loop available, and we will be using a mic and doing sound checks before the event for clarity. If you require closed captioning, ASL interpreters, or have other accessibility needs we might not have thought of, please reach out to danielle@masspoetry.org. We will do our best to accommodate any and all requests.
Saturday June 25, 2022 6:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
GrubStreet's Center for Creative Writing
 
Thursday, June 30
 

7:00pm EDT

The Grand Reopening of the Poetorium at Starlite Poetry Reading Series Featuring Meg Smith
Thursday June 30, 2022 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Please join us on June 30th for the grand reopening of our monthly open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite (after a two-year hiatus due to COVID) hosted by Paul Szlosek and Ron Whittle. It will be a full evening of poetry and spoken word starting with a brief interview on stage with our featured poet Meg Smith (Author of Dear Deepest Ghost, Night’s Island, This Scarlet Dancing, Pretty Green Thorns: New and Collected Poetry, and The Plague Confessor: Short Stories), followed by a poetry reading by our feature, a short intermission, and then the open mic (with 5-minute slots for each reader). Admission is free (but a hat will be passed to pay our features, and compensate The Starlite for the use of their space). Meg Smith is a writer, journalist, dancer, and events producer living in Lowell, MA. Her poetry has recently appeared in The Cafe Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Acropolis Journal, Poetry Bay, Beliveau Review, and many more. She served for 15 years on the board of Lowell Celebrates Kerouac!, a festival honoring Lowell-born author Jack Kerouac. She produces the Edgar Allan Poe Show, honoring Poe’s presence in Lowell. She is author of five poetry books and a short fiction collection, The Plague Confessor, and welcomes visits to megsmithwriter.com
Thursday June 30, 2022 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Starlite Bar & Art Gallery
 
Sunday, July 10
 

3:00pm EDT

Longfellow Summer Poetry Festival: Martha Collins and Philip Nikolayev
Join us for the 2022 Longfellow Summer Poetry Festival! All events are free and open to the public - just bring a picnic blanket or lawn chair! The series is co-sponsored by the Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters and the New England Poetry Club. Visit https://www.nps.gov/long/planyourvisit/summer-festival.htm for details.

Martha Collins has published ten volumes of poetry, most recently Because What Else Could I Do (Pittsburgh, 2019), which won the Poetry Society of America’s William Carlos Williams Award. She has also published four volumes of co-translated Vietnamese poetry, most recently Black Stars: Poems by Ngo Tu Lap (Milkweed, 2013, with the author), and edited a number of anthologies. Her newest book of poems, Casualty Reports, is forthcoming in fall 2022.

Philip Nikolayev is a Russo-American bilingual poet living in Boston. He is a polyglot and translates poetry from several languages. Nikolayev’s verse collections include Monkey Time (Verse/Wave Books, winner of the 2001 Verse Prize) and Letters from Aldenderry (Salt). He co-edits Fulcrum, a serial anthology of poetry and critical writing. His bilingual edition, The Star of Dazzling Ecstasy: 79 Poems by Alexander Pushkin, Translated by Philip Nikolayev has been published by Tiptop Street.
 
Thursday, September 8
 

6:30pm EDT

Podcasting for Everyone: Getting Started Is Easier Than You Think! (In-person Event)
Thursday September 8, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Podcasting is enjoying a resurgence lately, and it's easy to think that you need formal training or fancy equipment to try it out. You don't. In a discussion moderated by GrubStreet's Director of Community Engagement (and podcast lover) Eson Kim, come hear how podcasters Heloiza Barbosa and Felix Poon started out with zero podcast experience and eventually developed their craft into personally meaningful and award-winning works. There will be time for audience questions as well!

Directly following the event, there will be a small Open House tour of GrubStreet's new podcast studio space. Sign-ups will be available at the event for those who are interested.

Exhibitors
Thursday September 8, 2022 6:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
GrubStreet 162 Boylston Street 5th FL Boston, MA 02116
 
Friday, September 16
 

7:00pm EDT

The Civic Role of Poetry: For, By & Of the People with Richard Blanco
Friday September 16, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Selected by President Obama as the fifth inaugural poet in U.S. history, Richard Blanco is the first Latino, immigrant, and gay person to serve in such a role. Born in Madrid to Cuban exile parents and raised in Miami, the negotiation of cultural identity characterizes his four collections of poetry: How To Love a Country, City of a Hundred Fires, which received the Agnes Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press; Directions to The Beach of the Dead, recipient of the Beyond Margins Award from the PEN American Center; and Looking for The Gulf Motel, recipient of the Paterson Poetry Prize and the Thom Gunn Award. He has also authored the memoirs For All of Us, One Today: An Inaugural Poet’s Journey and The Prince of Los Cocuyos: A Miami Childhood, winner of a Lambda Literary Award. His inaugural poem “One Today” was published as a children’s book, in collaboration with renowned illustrator Dav Pilkey. Boundaries, a collaboration with photographer Jacob Hessler, challenges the physical and psychological dividing lines that shadow the United States. And his latest book of poems, How to Love a Country, both interrogates the American narrative, past and present, and celebrates the still unkept promise of its ideals. Blanco has written occasional poems for the re-opening of the U.S. Embassy in Cuba, Freedom to Marry, the Tech Awards of Silicon Valley, and the Boston Strong benefit concert following the Boston Marathon bombings. He is a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and has received numerous honorary doctorates. He has taught at Georgetown University, American University, and Wesleyan University. He serves as the first Education Ambassador for The Academy of American Poets.
Speakers
Friday September 16, 2022 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Follen Church Society
 
Thursday, September 22
 

5:30pm EDT

Fall 2022 Open House & Info Session
Thursday September 22, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Love to write but don't have anywhere to get feedback on your work? Want to meet fellow writers and work under the guidance of published authors? GrubStreet is here to help!

On Thursday, September 22nd from 6:30pm-7:30pm, we will be hosting an In-Person Open House to talk about upcoming Fall 2022 classes, GrubStreet's membership program, GrubStreet's Boston Writers of Color Group, The Muse and the Marketplace and more!

After a short presentation from GrubStreet staff, we will be on hand to answer any questions you have and show off our brand new space, including our expanded classrooms for teens and adults, the bookstore run by our friends at Porter Square Books (complete with rotating bookshelves), our community lounge, Boston’s only stage for the literary arts, our podcast studio, and more.

This event is free and includes complimentary drinks and snacks. Bring your mask, join the fun!

Please make sure to pre-register! We'll also send all attendees a code to receive 10% off any Fall 2022 class.

Exhibitors
Thursday September 22, 2022 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
GrubStreet 162 Boylston Street 5th FL Boston, MA 02116
 
Tuesday, January 3
 

7:00pm EST

Poetry in the Parlor, curated by the New England Poetry Club
Tuesday January 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Friday, January 3, 7 pm
Poetry in the Parlor, curated by the New England Poetry Club
Kenneth Lee, Gloria Mindock, and Tontongi
The Old Manse
Concord, MA
Tuesday January 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
The Old Manse

7:00pm EST

Unearthed Song & Poetry Open Mic: Oliver de la Paz
Tuesday January 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:30pm EST
  • January 3, Time 7:00PM - 9:30PM. home.stead bakery & cafeUnearthed Song & Poetry Open Mic  



Tuesday January 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:30pm EST
Home.stead Bakery and Cafe
 
Wednesday, January 4
 

6:00pm EST

Lesley January Reading Series Presents: Carl Phillips
Wednesday January 4, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Poetry reading by Carl Phillips at the Marran Theatre at Lesley University, located at 34 Mellen Street, in Cambridge, MA.

Wednesday January 4, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Marran Theater
 
Friday, January 6
 

6:00pm EST

Lesley January Reading Series Presents: Sharon Bryan and Rachel Kadish
Friday January 6, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Poetry reading by Sharon Bryan, and fiction reading by Rachel Kadish, at Lesley University's Marran Theater, located at 34 Mellen Street, in Cambridge, MA.
Friday January 6, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Marran Theater
 
Sunday, January 8
 

7:00pm EST

WCPA Board Meeting
Sunday January 8, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Join the board of the Worcester County Poetry Association for our monthly meeting. This is a working meeting, not a poetry reading. We welcome to the respectful input of the poetry community.

Due to the first Wednesday falling on a holiday our board meeting is being held on January 8th this month. It will be a teleconference meeting. Please e-mail wcpaboard@yahoo.com for the call-in details.

This is a great opportunity to learn more about how the board supports the rich literary history and creative energy of Central Massachusetts.

Sunday January 8, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
WCPA Office @ the Sprinkler Factory 38 Harlow Street, Worcester, MA 01605
 
Tuesday, January 10
 

7:00pm EST

Brookline Booksmith: Five Brookline Poets Reading
Tuesday January 10, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Five Brookline Poets share their work with the community that inspired them. »Zvi Sesling is the Poet Laureate of Brookline, MA and a prize winning poet. He has been published widely in print and online nationally and internationally. Sesling is Editor of Muddy River Poetry Review, publishes Muddy River Books and reviews for the Boston Small Press and Poetry Scene.
Jan Schreiber is an American poet, translator, and literary critic who has been part of the renascence of formal poetry that began in the late twentieth century. He is the author of four books of verse, two books of verse translation and one book of literary criticism.
Judith Steinbergh was selected as first Poet Laureate for the town of Brookline, MA for a 3 year term ending on April 1, 2015. She is the author of 4 poetry books and 3 poetry teaching texts. She also teaches and mentors students and teachers for Troubadour, Inc.
Deborah Leipziger is an author, poet, and professor. Her chapbook, Flower Map, was published by Finishing Line Press (2013). In 2014, her poem “Written on Skin” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Born in Brazil, Ms. Leipziger is the author of several books on human rights and sustainability. Her poems have been published in SalamanderVoices IsraelPOESYWilderness House ReviewIbbetson Street, and the Muddy River Poetry Review.
Tino Villanueva is the author of seven books of poetry and has taught creative writing at the University of Texas-Austin, the College of William & Mary, and Bowdoin College. His artwork has appeared on the covers and pages of national and international journals such as NexosGreen Mountains ReviewTriQuarterlyParnassus, and MELUS. He teaches in the Department of Romance Studies at Boston University.




Tuesday January 10, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Brookline Booksmith
 
Wednesday, January 11
 

3:00pm EST

Powow River Poets Reading Series: Elizabeth Wolf and Anton Yakovlev
Wednesday January 11, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EST
The bimonthly Powow River Poets Readings Series, started in 1992, is free and open to the public, and includes an Open Mic. Poetry enthusiasts are urged to attend. Most readings are held on the second Saturday of the month at 3:00 p.m. at the Newburyport Public Library, 94 State Street in Newburyport, Massachusetts.
Past readers have featured such eminent poets as former NEA Chairman Dana Gioia, X.J. Kennedy, Alicia Stallings, David Ferry, Robert Shaw, and talented newcomers like Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize recipient Rose Kelleher. 
Recent invited poets included New Criterion Award winner Dan Brown, poet and translator Rachel Hadas, magazine editors and award-winning poets David Yezzi and Joseph Bottum. Other Powow readers include Catherine Tufariello, Josh Mehigan, Mimi White, Catherine Chandler, Ernie Hilbert, Rick Mullin, Nick Balbo, Annie Finch, and other fine poets and friends of the formalist tradition.
The Open Mic is limited to ten poets, so come early to the library to sign up. The time limit is one poem or two minutes, whichever is shorter, so please time your reading when you rehearse.   

Wednesday January 11, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EST
Newburyport Public Library
 
Thursday, January 12
 

3:00pm EST

Concord Poetry at the Library Series
Thursday January 12, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Thursday January 12, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Concord Free Public Library
 
Monday, January 16
 

7:00pm EST

Transnational Series: E.J. Koh in conversation with Jennifer Tseng
Monday January 16, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
The Magical Language of Others is a powerful and aching love story in letters, from mother to daughter. After living in America for over a decade, Eun Ji Koh’s parents return to South Korea for work, leaving fifteen-year-old Eun Ji and her brother behind in California. Overnight, Eun Ji finds herself abandoned and adrift in a world made strange by her mother’s absence. Her mother writes letters, in Korean, over the years seeking forgiveness and love–letters Eun Ji cannot fully understand until she finds them years later hidden in a box.
The Magical Language of Others weaves a profound tale of hard-won selfhood and our deep bonds to family, place, and language, introducing–in Eun Ji Koh–a singular, incandescent voice.
E. J. Koh is the author of the poetry collection A Lesser Love, winner of the Pleiades Editors Prize (Louisiana State U. Press, 2017). Her poems, translations, and stories have appeared in Boston ReviewLos Angeles Review of Books, and World Literature Today, among others. She is the recipient of The MacDowell Colony and Kundiman fellowships and a 2017 ALTA Emerging Translator Mentorship, and was runner-up for the 2018 Prairie Schooner Summer Nonfiction Prize.
Jennifer Tseng’s flash fiction collection, The Passion of Woo & Isolde (Rose Metal Press 2017), was a Firecracker Award finalist and winner of an Eric Hoffer Book Award; and her novel, Mayumi and the Sea of Happiness (Europa Editions 2015), was shortlisted for the PEN American Center’s Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the New England Book Award. She’s also published three award-winning books of poetry, The Man With My Face (AAWW 2005); the bilingual Red Flower, White Flower (Marick Press 2013) featuring Chinese translations by Mengying Han and Aaron Crippen; and Not so dear Jenny (Bateau Press 2017), poems made with her Chinese father’s English letters. Jennifer and her sister, visual artist Amanda Tseng, collaborate on Instagram @tseng.sisters, using the hashtag #sistersreadingsisters. Together, her sister’s images and her micro reviews celebrate books by women of color, queer women and women in translation—past, present, and future.

Speakers
Monday January 16, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Brookline Booksmith
 
Tuesday, January 17
 

6:30pm EST

The Visible Planets by Aly Pierce Release Show
Tuesday January 17, 2023 6:30pm - 9:30pm EST
The Visible Planets by Aly Pierce is dropping on 1/17! Come hang out with us

We'll have sets from Aly Pierce, Lip Manegio, Cassandra de Alba, and more!

Michael Malpiedi and Kaleigh O'Keefe are co-hosting!

Makeshift Boston is an amazing community space and we're excited to show you our newest book release!

Space is limited so please register. Admission is free! Come on time and hang out with the whole GOB crew.

The space is wheelchair accessible! This show is alcohol free.

Any questions? Message Game Over Books on Facebook or Instagram.
Tuesday January 17, 2023 6:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Make Shift Boston
 
Thursday, January 19
 

3:00pm EST

Brookline Poetry Series: Rodney Jones
Thursday January 19, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
January 19, 2020
Featured Reader: Rodney Jones
Rodney Jones is the author of eleven books of poems. His honors include the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Harper Lee Award, and the Kingsley Tufts Award, and he has been a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award, the Griffin International Poetry Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize. His poems have appeared widely in magazines and in nine editions of Best American PoetryVillage Prodigies, his latest book, doubles as a book of poems and an experimental novel. He lives in New Orleans and teaches in the low-residency MFA program at Warren Wilson College.
Opening Reader: Mitch Manning
Mitch Manning is the author of city of water (Arrowsmith, 2019). He’s taught poetry in central China and his poems have been read in Basra, southern Iraq as part of the Boston to Basra Project. He teaches in the English and Labor Studies programs at UMass Boston, and is Associate Director at the Joiner Institute for the Study of War and Social Consequences. He’s an Associate Editor for CONSEQUENCE magazine and founder of NO INFINITE, a journal of petry, art, and protest. Poems and interviews published in The DorisBOOG CityLet The Bucket DownCONSEQUENCESundialHollowGAFF and more.

Speakers
Thursday January 19, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Hunneman Hall, Brookline Village Library 361 Washington St. Brookline
 
Friday, January 20
 

9:00pm EST

The Dirty Gerund Poetry Series featuring Adam Stone
Friday January 20, 2023 9:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Open mic followed by feature from Adam Stone.

21+, free admission, donations accepted.
Speakers
Friday January 20, 2023 9:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Ralph's Rock Diner 148 Grove St., Worcester
 
Saturday, January 21
 

7:00pm EST

January U35 Reading | Mass Poetry
Saturday January 21, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
U35 is a bi-monthly reading series for poets under 35, held once each January, March, May, July, September, and November. The series seeks to promote and bolster young Massachusetts poets while giving them a venue to share their work and connect with other poets. If you are a poet under the age of 35, sign up to read via Mass Poetry's website! This event is free and open to the public. 

http://www.masspoetry.org/u35

Our January readers are:

Raina K. Puels is a queer, polyamorous human living in Allston. She graduated from Emerson with her MFA in May of 2019. Her collection of essays, Resaturation was long-listed for PANK's book prize. By day, she works as an admin at MIT and by night, she hangs out with her little black cat, Layla Stoner Sparkle Demon. You can read her writing in The Rumpus, GAY Mag, American Literary Review, Yes Poetry, and many other places listed on her website: rainakpuels.com. 

Ananya Panchal is a 20-year-old Boston University student studying Journalism and Criminal Justice. For as long as she can remember, Ananya has loved writing. Journalism is her way of analyzing and entering the dialogue of the world around her, but poetry has always been her way of analyzing herself and her many emotions. Ananya has self-published a book of poetry, performed at open mics and given a Ted Talk in her hometown of Los Altos, California. This is her first Boston performance.

Casey Lynn Roland is a second year graduate student at the University of New Hampshire, pursuing an MFA in Poetry. She lives, works, writes, and makes art on the North Shore of Massachusetts, but spends much of her time on Lake Winnipesaukee; her poetry attempts to reconcile her relationships to those places, the people in them, and how they are always changing. Casey’s current obsessions are folklore, trees, and the idea that all time is simultaneous. She also creates blackout poetry, and you can see some of her work on Instagram at @mscaseycreates and at www.caseylynnroland.com.

Saturday January 21, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Trident Booksellers & Cafe
 
Sunday, January 22
 

8:00pm EST

Devin Kelly Features at the Boston Poetry Slam
Sunday January 22, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Devin Kelly will be the featured poet at the Boston Poetry Slam on Wednesday, January 22, 2020. 

Devin Kelly is the author of In This Quiet Church of Night, I Say Amen (Civil Coping Mechanisms) and the co-host of the Dead Rabbits Reading Series. He is the winner of a Best of the Net Prize, and his writing has appeared or is forthcoming in The Guardian, LitHub, Catapult, DIAGRAM, Redivider, and more. He lives and teaches high school in New York City.

An open poetry slam is scheduled for the late-night portion of this show, following the feature. The slam will be speed slam format: eight open sign-ups will be available starting at door time, and poets will slam head-to-head in up to three rounds with time limits of 3, 2, and 1 minute. Winner and runner-up qualify for the 2020 Team Selection series. To volunteer to judge in exchange for free admission to the show, or to ask questions about the slam, email the slam curator at slamseries@bostonpoetryslam.com.

SCHEDULE
7:15pm: doors and sign-ups open
8:00pm: open mic
10:00pm: Devin Kelly features
11:00ish: open poetry slam
More info about the show: http://bostonpoetryslam.com/?p=9666

The show is 18+, $3 and the bar is cash only. Everyone must show a photo ID to enter the Cantab Lounge.

Speakers Exhibitors
Sunday January 22, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, January 23
 

7:00pm EST

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Monday January 23, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Monday January 23, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Roslindale House

7:00pm EST

Cape Cod Poetry Review Launch
Monday January 23, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Monday January 23, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Wellfleet Library 55 West Main St., Wellfleet, MA

8:00pm EST

Countertop Chants: January Poetry Session
Monday January 23, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Countertop Chants is proud to host Poetry Sessions that celebrate our craft, art of all mediums, community, and local businesses. 
Join us the 4th Thursday every month for a lively open mic at Canopy Room, one of the newest spots for local artists and entrepreneurs in the Boston area! This month’s session will be held Thursday, January 23rd,, from 8 to 10 pm. 

SCHED:
Space opens at 8 pm, reading starts at 8:15pm! Our intermission music starts promptly at 9 pm. We have 10 spots for poetry reading, with music from this month's guest, Sophie London. Each reader will have 5 minutes at the mic, sign ups will be open until we fill the spots. 

ABOUT THE READING: 
This is a place to share your work, meet new artist friends, explore the Boston area, and have fun. Boston has a strong community of artists and writers and they deserve an inclusive space to connect and enjoy their art while still making it a party. We are here to celebrate life, arts, and our community. 

This is not a competition! There will be no winners, and there is no expected format. Tell us your dreams through acrostic poems, give us just a taste of your despair with a haiku. Whatever form you take, we celebrate it. 

We do book our intermission act in advance. If you are interested in playing acoustic music, doing an interpretative dance, or something that compliments the poetic medium, drop us a line at countertopchants@gmail.com 


ABOUT THE SPACE: 
We are hosting our poetry sessions in the event space of Bow Market, Canopy Room. We are teaming up with local businesses to foster our local artists. There is no cover to get in, but there is a cash/credit card bar! So please enjoy libations during the reading and have a little fun with us. 

Bow Market is home to many retail shops, restaurants, brewery and more. Grab food from one of these shops and bring it with you to the reading, or get here early and explore some of the shops before you join us!

Monday January 23, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Canopy Room 1 Bow Market Way, Somerville MA 02143
 
Tuesday, January 24
 

7:30pm EST

Freeverse! Team Slam at Mill City Speaks ft. Febo
Tuesday January 24, 2023 7:30pm - 10:00pm EST
Freeverse!
@Mill City Speaks
Wicked Loud Team Qualifier Slam
$100 in prizes

Poets 13 to 19 are eligible to compete
Please contact Untitled Open Mic on Facebook

Hosted by and with a spotlight feature from
ANTHONY FEBO

Friday, January 24
7:30 to 10 pm

@ Coffee & Cotton in Mill No. 5
250 Jackson Street
Lowell, MA

4th Friday of Every Month
Poetry Slam
Open Mic
Tuesday January 24, 2023 7:30pm - 10:00pm EST
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852
 
Wednesday, January 25
 

TBA

IAWA in Boston Presents
Wednesday January 25, 2023 TBA
Speakers
Wednesday January 25, 2023 TBA
I Am Books
 
Thursday, January 26
 

1:00pm EST

Curt Curtin @ Tatnuck Bookseller
Thursday January 26, 2023 1:00pm - 2:30pm EST
Curt Curtin will present work from his first full-length book of poetry, titled "For Art's Sake."  Due to his low vision, Curt will introduce his poems which will be read by his wife, Dee.)

Thursday January 26, 2023 1:00pm - 2:30pm EST
Tatnuck Bookseller and Cafe 18 Lyman Street, Westborough, MA
 
Friday, January 27
 

8:30pm EST

Dirty Gerund Poetry Show ft. Lynne Schmidt
Friday January 27, 2023 8:30pm - 11:30pm EST
Featured Poet: Lynn(e) Schmidt is the author of the poetry chapbooks, Gravity (Nightingale & Sparrow Press), On Becoming a Role Model ( Thirty West Publishing House, Spring 2020), and Dead Dog Poems (Bottlecap Press, Summer 2020). She is a mental health professional in Maine writing memoir, poetry, and young adult fiction. Her work has received the Maine Nonfiction Award, Editor's Choice Award, Honorable Mention for the Charles Bukowski Poetry Award, and was a 2018 and 2019 PNWA finalist for memoir and poetry respectively. When given the choice, Lynne prefers the company of her three dogs and one cat to humans. 

Bonus Ruckus: The return of the Holy Hot Sauce Sonnet Challenge! We'll bring an absurd hot sauce for you to shoot! Also some sonnets. Survive the dumbness and we'll reward you and stuff! 

The super talented Hal Gaucher is providing the visual arts!

Joy Pond is holding it DOWN on snacks! 

Music by Jacob Leevai and (hopefully) friends! 

21 plus
$2 to $5 suggested donation
Speakers
Friday January 27, 2023 8:30pm - 11:30pm EST
Ralph's Rock Diner 148 Grove St., Worcester
 
Saturday, January 28
 

6:00pm EST

Amesbury Public Library Poetry Series
Saturday January 28, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Amesbury Public Library begins its 2020 poetry series, with featured poet, Toni Treadway. Toni has been a member of the Powow River Poets since 2004. Her first poetry book “Late Harvest” came last year from Kelsay Books. Its title poem was a runner up for the 2019 Robert Frost Prize in Lawrence, Mass. She became co-organizer of the Powow Poets reading series at the Newburyport Public Library in 2015. She listens for music in nature and to share old struggles with odd friends. A handful of her poems are online with links on her page at the PowowRiverPoets.com website. She restores old movie film for archives with her partner Bob Brodsky and they sing in the Newburyport Choral Society. Toni is an enthusiastic reader at the Whittier Home's Tapestry of Voices poetry event held each August.
The Amesbury Public Library, 149 Main St. hosts a monthly poetry series with an open mic. Each month there is a featured poet followed by a discussion, an open mic and light refreshments. Ellie O'Leary, Amesbury Poet Laureate, hosts this event. Free and open to the public. For info: amesburypubliclibrary.org or 978-388-9771
Saturday January 28, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Amesbury Public Library

7:00pm EST

Thirsty Lab Reading Series: Michael Milligan
Saturday January 28, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
The Thirsty Lab Reading Series is on 206 Worcester Road in Princeton, MA 01541. The series began in 2013 and happens the fourth and fifth Tuesdays of every month from 7-9 p.m. There is no open. The reader has the full two hours to use as s/he wishes. Some read two sets of 30-45 minutes. Some bring musicians to play behind the words.  Some use part of the time for a workshop session and discussion. There is usually a bottle of wine to share, some home baked treats, great discussion and a poetically intelligent audience.
Speakers
Saturday January 28, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
206 Worcester Road 206 Worcester Road, Princeton, MA 01541

7:00pm EST

The Poetorium at Starlite Reading Series & Open Mic Featuring Richard H. Fox
Saturday January 28, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Please join us on January 28th for our monthly open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite hosted by Paul Szlosek and Ron Whittle. It will be a full evening of poetry and spoken word starting with a brief interview on stage with our featured poet Richard H. Fox (Author of Time Bomb, Wandering in Puzzle Boxes, You're My Favorite Horse, and The Complete Uncle Louie Poems), followed by a poetry reading by our feature, a 10-minute tribute to a dead poet by a guest reader, a short intermission, and then the open mic (with 5-minute slots for each reader). Admission is free (but a hat will be passed to pay our features)

Moderators
Saturday January 28, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Starlite Bar & Gallery
 
Sunday, January 29
 

TBA

8:00pm EST

Porsha Olayiwola Features at the Boston Poetry Slam
Sunday January 29, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Porsha Olayiwola will be the featured poet at the Boston Poetry Slam on Wednesday, January 29, 2020. 

Porsha Olayiwola is from the future! Black, poet, queer-dyke, hip-hop feminist, womanist: Porsha is a native of Chicago who now resides in Boston. Olayiwola is a writer, performer, educator and curator who uses afro-futurism and surrealism to examine historical and current issues in the Black, woman, and queer diasporas. She is an Individual World Poetry Slam Champion and the artistic director at MassLEAP, a literary youth organization. Olayiwola is an MFA Candidate at Emerson College. Porsha Olayiwola is the author of i shimmer sometimes, too forthcoming with Button Poetry and is the current Poet Laureate for the city of Boston.

There will be NO poetry slam competition after the feature tonight; please come celebrate our feature and her new book. 

SCHEDULE
7:15pm: doors and sign-ups open
8:00pm: open mic
10:00pm: Porsha Olayiwola features
More info about the show: http://bostonpoetryslam.com/?p=9694

The show is 18+, $3 and the bar is cash only. Everyone must show a photo ID to enter the Cantab Lounge.
Exhibitors
Sunday January 29, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, January 30
 

TBA

Deep Curation: an experimentally curated poetry reading
Monday January 30, 2023 TBA
Lee Ann Brown, Sawako Nakayasu, Klara Du Plessis
with audio of Fanny Howe's poetry
in the Front Theater Space
Monday January 30, 2023 TBA
Boston Playwrights' Theatre 949 Commonwealth Avenue

TBA

Poetry & Open Mic Night w/ Amanda Coleman
Monday January 30, 2023 TBA
Poetry & Open Mic Night
Hosted by Amanda Coleman
Read poetry, play music, share comedy and stories! Come be creative with us!
Monday January 30, 2023 TBA
Cleat and Anchor 243 Lower County Road, Dennis Port, Massachusetts 02639
 
Tuesday, January 31
 

7:00pm EST

Author Talk: The Art of the Memoir
Tuesday January 31, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Join local writers for the next quarterly Author Talk at FYACS with Memoir writers Calvin Hennick and Mimi Lemay as they talk about writing from a personal place. Moderated by Melrose author and Memoirist Jane Roper. $5 for members/$10 for non-members. Click here for tickets.

Mimi Lemay, a former Melrose resident, became an advocate for transgender and non-binary youth shortly after her son Jacob’s transition in 2014, at the age of four. Published in November 2019, Lemay’s memoir, What We Will Become, has received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, Booklist and Library Journal and a ringing endorsement from Congressman Joe Kennedy III who said, “It is a striking call to action for a country where every child is worthy, believed in, and loved.”
Calvin Hennick’s debut memoir, “Once More to the Rodeo,” holds a mirror up to both himself and modern America, as he grapples with what it means to be a white father to a biracial son. In search of answers, Calvin takes his young son on the road, traveling across the country to the annual rodeo in his small Iowa hometown. “Once More to the Rodeo” received the Pushcart Press Editors' Book Award and was named one of the Best 100 Books of the Year by Amazon.
There will be refreshments and books will be sold onsite during the event by Whitelam Books of Reading. Get yours signed by the authors on at the event.
Tuesday January 31, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Follow Your Art Community Studios 647 Main Street Melrose, MA 02176
 
Thursday, February 2
 

1:00pm EST

2:00pm EST

Temple Sinai’s 11th Annual Poetry Festival
Thursday February 2, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
This year’s featured poet is Rachel Kann -- a poet, performer, ceremonialist and teaching artist. Her writing has appeared in journals such as Soul-Lit, Tiferet, Eclipse, Permafrost, Coe Review, Sou’wester, GW Review and Quiddity. She is a resident writer for Hevria, where she’s also featured as a performing artist on The Hevria Sessions.  Rachel has performed her poetry in such varied venues as Disney Concert Hall, Royce Hall, the Broad Stage and San Francisco Palace of Fine Arts. She is a 2019 Inquiry Fellow through American Jewish University’s Institute for Jewish Creativity and was a 2017 Asylum Arts Reciprocity Fellow and the 2017 Outstanding Instructor of the Year at UCLA Extension Writers' Program. Her latest poetry collection is How to Bless the New Moon, from Ben Yehuda Press. Her poetry collections include A Prayer on Behalf of the Broken Heart and 10 for Everything. She is also the author of the children’s book, You Sparkle Inside.

Master of Ceremonies: Professor Larry Lowenthal

An open mic will follow!
Readers bring one original poem on themes of family, community, or Jewish life. Sign up to read as you enter.  Questions?  Contact Deborah Leipziger at dleipziger@gmail.com
Speakers

Thursday February 2, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Temple Sinai

7:00pm EST

Moonlighting Featuring Keely Fae & Justice Ameer
Where: The Democracy Center (45 Mt. Auburn St. Cambridge-- there is a wheelchair accessible entrance on the right hand side of the building if you are facing the front entrance)
 When: January 5th, 2019   
  Doors Open at 7:00pm Open Mic Starts at 7:30pm
 Cost: $5 suggested cover. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. 
 
 What is Moonlighting? 
 
Moonlighting is a queer open mic presented by the Boston Poetry Slam. This reading series is a revival of a Cambridge favorite hosted and produced by Myles Taylor and Ilyus Evander. We aim to build, stew in, and celebrate the queer community and their words and work in Cambridge and the surrounding areas.
Thursday February 2, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
THE DEMOCRACY CENTER , 45 MOUNT AUBURN STREET, CAMBRIDGE MA (HARVARD SQUARE) THE DEMOCRACY CENTER , 45 MOUNT AUBURN STREET, CAMBRIDGE MA (HARVARD SQUARE)
 
Saturday, February 4
 

7:00pm EST

Black History Month Open Mic & Karaoke Night!
Saturday February 4, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Happy new year FEMS, and happy Black History Month! Come celebrate with us ♥ bring yourself, a piece of writing by a Black artist who inspires you (can be yourself!), and your fav karaoke songs by Black artists to sing for the second half of the night!

Doors - 7pm
Open Mic / Readings - 7:30
Karaoke - 8:15 

Can't wait to see you there!!

Make Shift accessibility info:

Make Shift has a wheelchair accessible entrance, seating space, and bathroom. We are not a fragrance free or sober space (though we do not sell alcohol). Makeshift is 0.2 miles away from the Massachusetts Ave T stop on the Orange Line. Please feel free to message us with any accessibility questions or feedback.
Exhibitors
Saturday February 4, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Make Shift Boston
 
Sunday, February 5
 

TBA

7:00pm EST

WCPA Board Meeting
Sunday February 5, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Join the board of the Worcester County Poetry Association for our monthly meeting. This is a working meeting, not a poetry reading. We welcome to the respectful input of the poetry community.

This is a great opportunity to learn more about how the board supports the rich literary history and creative energy of Central Massachusetts.

If you would like to join the conference call, please e-mail wcpaboard @ yahoo.com for the call-in details.

#poetryofworcestercounty



Sunday February 5, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
WCPA Office @ the Sprinkler Factory 38 Harlow Street, Worcester, MA 01605

8:00pm EST

Tatiana M.R. Johnson Features at the Boston Poetry Slam
Sunday February 5, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Tatiana Mary Rebecca Johnson will be the featured poet at the Boston Poetry Slam on Wednesday, February 5, 2020. 

Tatiana M.R. Johnson (she/her/hers) is a writer, artist and educator in the Boston area. She’s an MFA candidate in poetry at Emerson College and works as poetry editor for the literary journal Redivider. She is a 2017 Pushcart Prize nominee and she’s recently been published in Southern Humanities Review as an Honorable Mention selection for the 2019 Auburn Witness Poetry Prize, judged by Vievee Francis. Tatiana’s writing is forthcoming in Transition Magazine and Aesthetica Magazine. Her writing explores identity and trauma, especially inherited trauma and what it means to heal.

An early-bird workshop is scheduled for the hour before doors open for the show. For more information, please see our separate workshop event, Tatiana M.R. Johnson Workshop at the Boston Poetry Slam.

Photo of the artist is courtesy Manuel Boria. 

SCHEDULE
7:15pm: doors and sign-ups open
8:00pm: open mic
10:00pm: Tatiana M.R. Johnson features
More info about the show: http://bostonpoetryslam.com/?p=9675

The show is 18+, $3 and the bar is cash only. Everyone must show a photo ID to enter the Cantab Lounge. There is one flight of stairs to access the room.
Sunday February 5, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, February 6
 

TBA

Barbara Thomas
Monday February 6, 2023 TBA
Monday February 6, 2023 TBA
Andala Cafe 286 Franklin St., Cambridge, MA

4:30pm EST

Experience and Experiment: Prose Writing Series
Monday February 6, 2023 4:30pm - 6:15pm EST
Gwendolyn Edward is hearing impaired, queer, and a member of the Cherokee Nation. Her writing has earned nominations for both the Pushcart and Best American Essays, and her prose and poetry have appeared in AssayCrab Orchard ReviewBrevityFourth RiverBooth, and others. She retains a MA from the University of North Texas, an MFA from Bennington College, and is currently finishing her PhD at the University of Missouri, where she lives with her partner. When she’s not weightlifting, playing video games, or reading all the books she’s amassed, she writes speculative fiction, nontraditional nonfiction, and bends genre. 
The Prose Writing Series is presented by the Department of English.
Speakers
Monday February 6, 2023 4:30pm - 6:15pm EST
Shattuck Hall, Cassani Room (102) (Mt. Holyoke) 50 College St, South Hadley, MA 01075

8:00pm EST

CAConrad + Dawn Lundy Martin
Monday February 6, 2023 8:00pm - 9:30pm EST
The University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers presents a reading by CAConrad and Dawn Lundy Martin on Thursday, February 6, 2020 at 8:00 p.m. in the Old Chapel. The reading will be followed by a book signing and refreshments. 

CAConrad is a 2019 Creative Capital Fellow and the author of 9 books of poetry and essays: their While Standing in Line for Death (Wave Books, 2017) received the 2018 Lambda Award. A recipient of a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, they also received the Believer Magazine Book Award and the Gil Ott Book Award. Their work has been translated into Spanish, Greek, Polish, Norwegian, Portuguese, Danish, French, and German. They teach regularly at Columbia University and at the Sandberg Art Institute in Amsterdam. Influenced by Eileen Myles, Audre Lorde, Alice Notley, and Emily Dickinson, Conrad writes poems in which stark images of sex, violence, and defiance build a bridge between fable and confession. They are a visiting faculty member for Spring 2020 at UMass Amherst.
 
Dawn Lundy Martin is a poet, essayist, and conceptual video artist. She is the author of four books of poems: Good Stock Strange Blood; Life in a Box is a Pretty Life; which won the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Poetry; DISCIPLINE; A Gathering of Matter / A Matter of Gathering; and three limited edition chapbooks. Most recently, she co-edited with Erica Hunt an anthology, Letters to the Future: BLACK WOMEN / Radical WRITING. Her nonfiction can be found in The New Yorker, Harper’s, n+1, and elsewhere. Martin is a Professor of English in the writing program at the University of Pittsburgh and Director of the Center for African American Poetry and Poetics. She is the recipient of the 2019 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.
 
Celebrating its fifty-sixth year, the nationally renowned Visiting Writers Series at UMass Amherst presents emerging and established writers of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. The Series is sponsored by the MFA for Poets and Writers and the Juniper Initiative, and made possible by support from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the University of Massachusetts Arts Council, the English Department, and others. 

All events are free, open to the public, and wheelchair accessible. Find us on Facebook here.
Monday February 6, 2023 8:00pm - 9:30pm EST
The Old Chapel, University of Massachusetts Amherst

8:00pm EST

Visiting Writers Series: CA Conrad and Dawn Lundy Martin
Monday February 6, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
CAConrad received a 2019 Creative Capital grant to complete their nationwide (Soma)tic poetry ritual titled, "Resurrect Extinct Vibration." They also received a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, as well as The Believer Magazine Book Award and The Gil Ott Book Award. The author of 9 books of poetry and essays, While Standing in Line for Death (Wave Books) won the 2018 Lambda Book Award. They teach regularly at Columbia University in New York City, and Sandberg Art Institute in Amsterdam. Spring 2020 they will be teaching at UMass, Amherst. Please view their books and the documentary The Book of Conrad from Delinquent Films online at http://bit.ly/88CAConrad
Dawn Lundy Martin is a poet, essayist, and conceptual video artist. She is the author of four books of poems: Good Stock Strange Blood; Life in a Box is a Pretty Life; which won the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Poetry; DISCIPLINE; A Gathering of Matter / A Matter of Gathering; and three limited edition chapbooks. Most recently, she co-edited with Erica Hunt an anthology, Letters to the Future: BLACK WOMEN / Radical WRITING. Her nonfiction can be found in The New Yorker, Harper’s, n+1, and elsewhere. Martin is a Professor of English in the writing program at the University of Pittsburgh and Director of the Center for African American Poetry and Poetics. She is the recipient of the 2019 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.
Monday February 6, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
UMass Amherst, Great Hall Great Hall, Old Chapel, 144 Hicks Way, University of Massachusetts
 
Tuesday, February 7
 

TBA

Patricia Cleary Miller
Tuesday February 7, 2023 TBA
TBA
Tuesday February 7, 2023 TBA
TBA

TBA

TBA

TBA

Poetry at the Y
Tuesday February 7, 2023 TBA
Speakers
Tuesday February 7, 2023 TBA
West Suburban YMCA

TBA

7:00pm EST

Bradley Trumpfheller: Reconstructions Book Release
Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Local poet (and Booksmith staff member!) Bradley Trumpfheller shares their beautiful collection.
“Bradley Trumpfheller has made for us (the ‘unbecame beloved across’) a simply stunning book that begs to be read aloud. I’m reminded here how tender and intelligent, how generous and fierce one must be to play with language, to let it make and be made from one’s body, to construct and to be re-constructed, to say anything one means and know ‘it will never mean again, not even now.”
-TC Tolbert, author of Gephyromania
Bradley Trumpfheller is from Alabama & Virginia. Their work has appeared in PoetryThe NationjubilatIndiana Review, and elsewhere. They co-edit Divedapper & currently live in Massachusetts.

Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Brookline Booksmith

7:00pm EST

First Fridays Youth Open Mic ft. Ariana Brown
Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Doors open at 7:00, and dinner is served shortly after (vegetarian and vegan options provided!) Open mic begins at 7:30. Bring your friends! Bring your art! You are welcome! $5-$10 suggested donation for all (no one turned away for lack of funds). All ages and talents are welcome on the mic! Open mic slots 3 minutes each. Sign up upon arrival. Hosted and organized by the First Baptist Church in Jamaica Plain and Kaleigh O'Keefe

FEATURED ARTIST: Ariana Brown

Ariana Brown is a queer Black Mexican American poet from San Antonio, Texas, with a B.A. in African Diaspora Studies and Mexican American Studies. She is the recipient of two Academy of American Poets Prizes and a 2014 collegiate national poetry slam champion. Ariana, who has been dubbed a “part-time curandera,” is primarily interested in using poetry to validate Black girl rage, in all its miraculous forms. Follow her work online at arianabrown.com or on Twitter & Instagram @arianathepoet.

*this venue is wheelchair accessible and has gender neutral restrooms*
Speakers
Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
First Baptist Church 633 Centre St, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130

7:00pm EST

Unearthed Song & Poetry Open Mic
Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Open Mic with poet Tomika Beyer, and Chris and George of Kingsley Flood, and of course, you! Doors and sign up at 7, show starts at 7:30, $5 cover. 

Tamiko Beyer is the author of Last Days (Alice James Books, forthcoming 2021), We Come Elemental (Alice James Books, 2013), and two chapbooks of poems. She publishes a monthly newsletter for living life wide awake and shaping change, Starlight & Strategy. A social justice communications writer and strategist, she spends her days writing truth to power.  Find her at tamikobeyer.com.

Chris Barrett and George Hall are veterans of the Boston music world.
Speakers
Tuesday February 7, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
home.stead café 1448 Dorchester Avenue, Dorchester, MA
 
Wednesday, February 8
 

TBA

TBA

2:00pm EST

Curt Curtin @ Annie's Book Stop
Wednesday February 8, 2023 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
Curt Curtin will present work from his first full-length book of poetry, titled "For Art's Sake."  Due to his low vision, Curt will introduce his poems which will be read by his wife, Dee.)

Wednesday February 8, 2023 2:00pm - 3:30pm EST
Annie's Book Stop (Worcester) 65 James Street, Worcester, MA 01603

7:00pm EST

Poetic Recovery
Wednesday February 8, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Are you a socially conscious hip-hop artist or poet who is looking to inspire, be inspired and collaborate with other like-minded individuals like yourself? Join us for this monthly Poetic Recovery workshop every 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month to share our own work within a supportive community. We will discuss artistic consciousness, different aspects of the cultural work, and the possibilities that potentially await you.
Bring something to write with, something to write on and you.
Suggested donation is $10.00.
--
The workshop host, Maurice Taylor, is an East Coast director of hip-hop congress and has been organizing open mics, poetry slams and hip-hop workshops for over 20 years. Maurice “Soulfighter” Taylor set out in 2006 to create Poetic Recovery as a platform to give voice to artists in recovery. It is a collection of cultural and educational activities that facilitate the nurturing of artists towards higher consciousness. These activities allow artists to reflect and perform for audiences from communities effected by traumatic experiences. These shared energies will help facilitate a cultural healing process between artists and community to recover of our cultural identity appropriated and exploited by the music industry that has resulted in cultural genocide.
Speakers
Wednesday February 8, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Make-It Springfield 168 Worthington Street Springfield, MA 01103
 
Thursday, February 9
 

TBA

3:00pm EST

New Poetry and Open Mic
Thursday February 9, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Members read from their new books, followed by an open mic
Speakers
Thursday February 9, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Center for the Arts at the Armory
 
Saturday, February 11
 

TBA

Raquel Salas Rivera
Saturday February 11, 2023 TBA
Saturday February 11, 2023 TBA
UMASS-Boston, Creative Writing MFA 100 William T, Morrissey Blvd, Boston, MA 02125

TBA

Inaugural Michael True Memorial Poetry Reading
Free and open to the public. Sponsored by Assumption College and the Worcester County Poetry Association.
Speakers
Saturday February 11, 2023 TBA
Assumption College, Jeanne Y. Curtis Performance Hall in the Tsotsis Family Academic Center 500 Salisbury Street, Worcester, MA 01609-1296

TBA

Cameron Awkward-Rich
Saturday February 11, 2023 TBA
Saturday February 11, 2023 TBA
Bethlehem Chapel, Brandeis University 415 South Street, Waltham

6:00pm EST

NOVELIST STEVEN DUNN & POET LORA STRAUB
Saturday February 11, 2023 6:00pm - 7:15pm EST
Authors Steven Dunn & Lora Straub read from their work and answer questions. Please join us for this literary arts event! This is a debut reading in Boston for Steven Dunn.
Steven Dunn is the author of the novels Potted Meat (Tarpaulin Sky Press, 2016) and water & power (Tarpaulin Sky 2018). He was born and raised in West Virginia, and after 10 years in the Navy, he earned a B.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Denver. Some of his work can be found in Columbia JournalGranta Magazine, and Best Small Fictions 2018.
Lora Straub lives in Lower Allston, MA. She received her BA in Literary Arts from Brown University and was awarded the Judith Lee Stronach Scholarship for Excellence in Poetry by St. Mary’s College of California, where she earned her Poetry MFA. She considers her writing to be hybrid genre and her chapbook, Id Est, was released in October 2017 by SpeCt! Books. Her work can be found in Construction Mag, She Explores, The Fem, The Elephants, Wave Composition, et al.
Speakers
Saturday February 11, 2023 6:00pm - 7:15pm EST
MassArt, Kennedy, 406

7:00pm EST

Newton Free Library Poetry Series
Saturday February 11, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Joyce Wilson--- Joyce Wilson, editor of The Poetry Porch, a literary magazine on the Internet since 1997, has taught English at Boston University and Suffolk University. A chapbook of twenty poems inspired by the Fore River Bridge, The Need for a Bridge, was published with Finishing Line Press in March 2019. A full-length manuscript Take and Receive appeared with Kelsay Books in May 2019.

James Najamar --- Lives in Newton. He teaches Victorian literature at Boston College, and edits the scholarly journal Religion and the Arts. His first book of poetry, The Goat Songs. won the Vassar Miller Prize and is being published by the University of North Texas Press this April. A. E. Stallings was the judge.

Ravi Yelamanchili-- His writing has previously been published in the Ibbetson Street, Muddy River Poetry Review, The Somerville Times, Sahitya Akademi's Indian Literature, Muse India, and several other journals.

Curated by Doug Holder
Saturday February 11, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Newton Free Library
 
Sunday, February 12
 

7:30pm EST

The Arts and the Experience of Nature
Sunday February 12, 2023 7:30pm - 8:45pm EST
The featured poets and artist for the evening:

David Davis, who was the first Poet in Residence at Joppa Flats and the founder of this series.

Janet MacFadyen (poet) and Stephen Schmidt (photographer), who will present a collaborative reading:

ADRIFT IN THE HOUSE OF ROCKS
a praise song for the earth

Janet will read poetry from their book, set to a slideshow of Steve's photos. “Now more than ever we need to rediscover our roots in the physical earth, and our dependency on the natural world. Join us on a journey to the beautiful, and besieged, national parklands of the desert southwest.”


An open mic will follow the features. For more info contact Lainie Senechal, Poet in Residence at Joppa Flats: emsenechal@gmail.com.
Speakers
Sunday February 12, 2023 7:30pm - 8:45pm EST
Mass Audubon's Joppa Flats Education Center

7:30pm EST

Poetry/Photo slideshow at Mass Audubon's Joppa Flats Education Center
Sunday February 12, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EST
Mass Audubon hosts The Arts and the Experience of Nature with poets Janet MacFadyen and David Davis, and photographer Stephen Schmidt. Slate Roof managing editor Janet MacFadyen and photographer Stephen Schmidt present Adrift in the House of Rock: a Praise Song for the Earth, a reading and slideshow set in the beautiful, besieged desert southwest. Their work is followed by a reading by former Poet-In-Residence at Mass Audubon's Joppa Flats, David Davis.

Bring your writing! The evening concludes with an open mic!

1 Plum Island Turnpike, Newburyport, MA

Janet MacFadyen is the author of five books of poetry, most recently Adrift in the House of Rocks (New Feral Press, 2019). Her work is forthcoming in Scientific American and has appeared in CALYX, Crannóg, Poetry, Q/A Poetry, and Terrain. Stephen Schmidt's photographs have won awards from Sierra and Earth magazines, and have appeared at the Merrill Lynch Corporate Gallery and The Arthur Griffin Center for Photographic Art. David Davis is the former Poet-In-Residence at Mass Audubon's Joppa Flats Education Center, and a member of the Powow River Poets. He is author of three poetry books, including The Joy Poems and Joppa Flats (Bard Brook Press, 2017/18).

Sunday February 12, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EST
Mass Audubon's Joppa Flats Education Center

8:00pm EST

The Poetry Brothel: Circus of Love
Sunday February 12, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
An interactive literary cabaret series that fuses poetry, burly-q, live music, aerials, vaudeville, visual art, magic, mysticism, and private, one-on-one poetry experiences.

Welcome to a unique and immersive poetry event that takes poetry outside classrooms and lecture halls and places it in the lush interiors of a bordello. The Madame presents a rotating cast of poets, each operating within a carefully crafted character, who share their work in public readings, spontaneous eruptions of poetry, and most distinctly, as purveyors of private poetry readings on beds, chaise lounges and in private rooms. For a fee, all of the poets are available for these sequestered readings at any time during the event. Of course, any true bordello need a good cover; ours is an immersive cabaret featuring poetry, burly-q, live music, vaudeville, aerials, visual art, magic, and mysticism, with newly integrated themes, performances and installations at each event.

Doors open at 8pm, and the show begins promptly at 8:30. Masks, costumes, and extravagant dress are encouraged but not required. For more information, please visit thepoetrybrothel.com.
Sunday February 12, 2023 8:00pm - 11:00pm EST
Sonia 10 Brookline Ave, Cambridge
 
Monday, February 13
 

TBA

 
Tuesday, February 14
 

TBA

 
Wednesday, February 15
 

1:00pm EST

The Brockton Library Poetry Series: Everyone Has a Voice
Wednesday February 15, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EST
Featured student poet Lola Bennett is a freshman at New Heights Charter School in Brockton. She loves to write because it makes her feel free. "I can write about something I have never done before or something that doesn't exist, when I am writing no rules apply."

Featured poet Nancy Brady Cunningham is a published poet and author of four books of non-fiction. She also co-edited, with Jack Scully, "The Book Of Arrows" by poet Mike Amado. She has won both the Barbara Bradley and the Gretchen Warren awards from the New England Poetry Club. Thirteen of her poems were included in "Unlocking the Poem" by Ottone M. Riccio and Ellen Beth Siegal. Nancy and drummer Mike Morin formed "the Poetry and Percussion Duo" and perform Southeaster Mass. She is a student of yoga, and has taught yoga and meditation classes for decades.

There will be an open mic & light refreshments will be served.
Speakers Exhibitors
Wednesday February 15, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EST
Driscoll Gallery, Brockton Public Library

3:00pm EST

Savoring Love: Poetry from the Heart: Rich Youmans, Alice Kociemba and an open mic
Wednesday February 15, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Rich Youmans’s narrative poetry has appeared in the Cape Cod Times, Cape Cod Poetry Review, and the Paterson Literary Review, among other publications, and his haiku, haibun, and related essays have been published internationally. Currently editor-in-chief of Contemporary Haibun Online, he has published a collection of linked haibun with Margaret Chula, Shadow Lines, which won a Merit Book Award from the Haiku Society of America, as well as two individual haibun collections, All the Windows Lit (Snapshot Press, 2015) and Head-On (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2018). Bob Lucky, in a review of Head-On, wrote, “There’s not one haibun in this chapbook that couldn’t be used to teach a master class.”

Alice Kociemba is the author of Bourne Bridge (Turning Point, 2016) and the chapbook, Death of Teaticket Hardware, the title poem of which won an International Merit Award from the Atlanta Review. Her poems have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies. Alice was Guest Editor of Common Threads, the poetry discussion project of Mass Poetry (2015 & 2016) and for the past ten years has led a poetry discussion group at the Falmouth Public Library. She is the founding director of Calliope: Poetry for Community and hosts “Poetic License,” a monthly open mic at FCTV.

Alice and Rich met through Calliope—and the rest, as they say is history. They now live in North Falmouth and are currently, along with Robin Smith-Johnson, editing an anthology titled From the Farther Shore: Discovering Cape Cod and the Islands Through Poetry; it will be published later this year by Bass River Press, an imprint of the Cultural Center of Cape Cod.
Wednesday February 15, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Woods Hole Public Library 581 Woods Hole Road, Woods Hole, MA 02543

4:00pm EST

Raquel Balboni Book Launch
Wednesday February 15, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EST
Speakers
Wednesday February 15, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EST
Outpost 186
 
Thursday, February 16
 

1:00pm EST

Longfellow Days 2020
Thursday February 16, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EST
The town of Brunswick, Maine, and the Curtis Memorial Library host a celebration of  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow with The Coursen Readings, four consecutive Sundays in February. Join Slate Roof member Audrey Gidman with poets Jane Costlow and David Sloan for the third event. The readings are part of Brunswick's month-long celebration honoring Longfellow, Maine filmmaker John Ford, and Edna St. Vincent Millay, leading up to Maine's Bicentennial.

For more information: 207-725-5242 or http://www.curtislibrary.com
Thursday February 16, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EST
Curtis Memorial Library 23 Pleasant St., Brunswick, ME 04011

2:00pm EST

Brookline Poetry Series
Thursday February 16, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Thursday February 16, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Hunneman Hall, Brookline Village Library 361 Washington St. Brookline
 
Friday, February 17
 

TBA

Patricia Cleary Miller
Friday February 17, 2023 TBA
Friday February 17, 2023 TBA
Grolier Book Shop

7:00pm EST

Small Press Book Club Discusses: Homie by Danez Smith
Friday February 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Read something off the beaten path! To contact our moderator email smallpress@brooklinebooksmith.com.

Discussing Homie by Danez Smith

Homie is Danez Smith’s magnificent anthem about the saving grace of friendship. Rooted in the loss of one of Smith’s close friends, this book comes out of the search for joy and intimacy within a nation where both can seem scarce and getting scarcer. In poems of rare power and generosity, Smith acknowledges that in a country overrun by violence, xenophobia, and disparity, and in a body defined by race, queerness, and diagnosis, it can be hard to survive, even harder to remember reasons for living. But then the phone lights up, or a shout comes up to the window, and family—blood and chosen—arrives with just the right food and some redemption. Part friendship diary, part bright elegy, part war cry, Homie is the exuberant new book written for Danez and for Danez’s friends and for you and for yours.

Danez Smith is the author of Don’t Call Us Dead, winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection and a finalist for the National Book Award, and [insert boy], winner of the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. They live in Minneapolis.



Friday February 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Brookline Booksmith
 
Saturday, February 18
 

7:00pm EST

First and Last Word Poetry Series
Saturday February 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Saturday February 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Arts at the Armory Café

7:30pm EST

Kathleen Graber @ the Poetry Center
Saturday February 18, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Taking its title from Heraclitus’s famous fragment—“You cannot step into the same river twice”—KATHLEEN GRABER’s new collection interweaves philosophy, personal narrative, and the flotsam of contemporary life to explore ideas linked to impermanence, change, language, and community. Poet Linda Gregerson has described Graber as “one of the finest poets working in America today; no one can surpass her for musicianship or moral penetration,” and Tracy K. Smith has praised Graber’s lyric philosophy as “supreme consolation” in this troubled era. In addition to The River Twice (Princeton University Press, 2019), Graber is also the author of The Eternal City (2010), chosen for the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets and a finalist for the National Book Award, and Correspondence (2006), winner of the Saturnalia Books Poetry Prize. She teaches creative writing and literature at Virginia Commonwealth University.



All of our main schedule readings are free and open to the public and begin at 7:30 p.m. Books can be purchased onsite and signings follow the readings. More detail can be found on our home page.





Speakers
Saturday February 18, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Smith College Campus Center, Carroll Room 100 Elm St, Northampton, MA 01063
 
Sunday, February 19
 

6:00pm EST

Boston Originals Series
Sunday February 19, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Sunday February 19, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Woodberry Poetry Room Lamont Library, Room 330
 
Monday, February 20
 

TBA

4:15pm EST

History Reconsidered: Poetry Reading with Clint Smith
Monday February 20, 2023 4:15pm - 5:15pm EST
Clint Smith is a doctoral candidate at Harvard University and an Emerson Fellow at New America. His writing has been published in the New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the Atlantic, Poetry Magazine, the Paris Review, and elsewhere. His first full-length collection of poetry, Counting Descent, published in 2016, won the 2017 Literary Award for Best Poetry Book from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association and was a finalist for the NAACP Image Award. His debut nonfiction book, How the Word Is Passed, which explores how different historical sites reckon with—or fail to reckon with—their relationship to the history of slavery, is forthcoming from Little, Brown.
 
The reading will be followed by a Q&A session with Amanda Gorman, 2017 National Youth Poet Laureate.
 
To register, visit www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2020-clint-smith-poetry-reading.
 
This event is part of the Roosevelt Poetry Readings at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. The Roosevelt Poetry Readings are made possible by a donor gift that will help bring poets of recognized stature to the Institute.
 
This event is free. Registration is required. We welcome students (of all levels and institutions) to attend our events.
Monday February 20, 2023 4:15pm - 5:15pm EST
Knafel Auditorium, Radcliffe Institute 10 Garden Street, Cambridge MA

6:00pm EST

Poetic Forms Writing Workshop led by Paul Szlosek
Monday February 20, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Learn how to write the anagrammatic selfie and its closely related French cousin the beau present in this free hour-long writing workshop for writers of all levels of experience (novice to expert) taught by local poet Paul Szlosek. Please bring a notebook and a pen or pencil to write with (Handouts will be provided). Also a smart phone, tablet, laptop or any device that can access the internet is recommend to take advantage of online resources that will help with writing your poems. About the Instructor - Paul Szlosek is a co-founder and host of both the former long-running Poet’s Parlor poetry venue  and the recently-created open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite in Southbridge, MA, is a past recipient of the Jacob Knight Award for Poetry, and have taught poetry workshops in the galleries at the Worcester Art Museum,the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA. His poems have appeared in various local publications including the Worcester Review, Worcester Magazine, Sahara, Concrete Wolf, and Diner.He is probably best known in the Worcester area poetry community for his fanatical obsession with obscure poetry forms, and has invented his own including the ziggurat, the streetbeatina, and (most recently) the hodgenelle which he shares on his blog Paul’s Poetry Playground at playground.poetry.blog.



Speakers
Monday February 20, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Bedlam Book Cafe

6:00pm EST

Salamander Issue #49 Release Party
Monday February 20, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Please join us to celebrate the release of  Salamander #49, with readings from contributors Moira Linehan, Sonya Larson, and David Moloney!

Light refreshments will be served.
Monday February 20, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Suffolk University Poetry Center

7:00pm EST

Rescue Press Poetry Reading @ Amherst Books
Monday February 20, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Rescue Press authors, Tessa Micaela, Caren Beilin, Hanna Brooks-Motl, & Melissa Dickey, will read from recent work.   Micaela writes poems & letters, often to inanimate objects.   They are the author of there are boxes and there is wantingCrude Matter, & Where Bells Begin .   Beilin is the author of SpainBlackfishing the IUD, & The University of Pennsylvania.   Brooks-Motl is the author of the poetry collections The New YearsM, & Earth.   Dickey is the author of two books of poems, Dragons & The Lily Will.   Her poetry, nonfiction, & reviews have appeared recently in Bennington Review, the Spectacle, the Laurel Review, & Kenyon Review Online, among other publications
Monday February 20, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Amherst Books 8 Main Street, Amherst, MA
 
Tuesday, February 21
 

7:00pm EST

Breakwater Reading Series February Reading
Tuesday February 21, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Boston's only inter-MFA reading series second reading of 2020, featuring: Anna Hull, Sofia Marlin, Christopher Stelson Wilson, Anita Ballesteros, Christie Towers, and Andria Warren! Come support these readers!

Tuesday February 21, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
56 Brattle Street Cambridge

7:30pm EST

The Juke: a Blues Bacchae
Tuesday February 21, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Join us for this foot-stomping, spirit-shaking concert version of an amazing new musical.From the pen of gifted poet/performer Regie Gibson comes this extraordinary adaptation of Euripides' classic tragedy.
Set in the small town of Crossroads, Mississippi, The Juke: A Blues Bacchae chronicles the fight between D'nysus, the divine son of the God of Blues, and his cousin Pent, defender of the Gospel faith, for the soul of the town.
With ear-popping poetic language and great music from gospel to jazz to funk to blues, this powerful human tale is guaranteed to thrill. Performed with a live band and some of Boston's most celebrated musical stars (including Elliot Norton Award Winner Davron Monroe and National Poetry Slam Winner and author Regie Gibson).

To reserve tickets ($10 general admission, $5 Somerville residents), go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-juke-a-blues-bacchae-tickets-92029000217/
Tuesday February 21, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Arts at the Armory Café
 
Wednesday, February 22
 

3:00pm EST

Gloria Mindock
Wednesday February 22, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Wednesday February 22, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Arts at the Armory/Basement B8

7:00pm EST

Curt Curt @ the Fourth Saturday Open Mic
Wednesday February 22, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
The Fourth Saturday Open Mic meets at Barnes & Noble on Lincoln Street in Worcester. Open mic at 7 pm, featured poets to follow. This month Curt Curtin will present work from his first full-length book of poetry, titled "For Art's Sake." Due to his low vision, Curt will introduce his poems which will be read by his wife, Dee.

After the featured poets read the gathered poetry lovers adjourn to the in-store coffee shop and chat about whatever comes up until management pushes us out the door at closing -- at about 10 pm. Please join us.

Wednesday February 22, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Barnes & Noble Bookstore (Worcester)

7:30pm EST

The Juke: A Blues Bacchae
Wednesday February 22, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Join us for this foot-stomping, spirit-shaking concert version of an amazing new musical.From the pen of gifted poet/performer Regie Gibson comes this extraordinary adaptation of Euripides' classic tragedy.
Set in the small town of Crossroads, Mississippi, The Juke: A Blues Bacchae chronicles the fight between D'nysus, the divine son of the God of Blues, and his cousin Pent, defender of the Gospel faith, for the soul of the town.
With ear-popping poetic language and great music from gospel to jazz to funk to blues, this powerful human tale is guaranteed to thrill. Performed with a live band and some of Boston's most celebrated musical stars (including Elliot Norton Award Winner Davron Monroe and National Poetry Slam Winner and author Regie Gibson).

To reserve tickets ($10 general admission, $5 Somerville residents), go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-juke-a-blues-bacchae-tickets-92029000217/
Wednesday February 22, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Arts at the Armory Café
 
Thursday, February 23
 

TBA

TBA

Worcester County Poetry Association Annual Meeting
Thursday February 23, 2023 TBA
Worcester County Poetry Association Annual Meeting with featured poet Maudelle Driskell, executive director of The Frost Place in NH. Business meeting and refreshments to follow.
Thursday February 23, 2023 TBA
First Unitarian Church, Worcester
 
Friday, February 24
 

TBA

7:00pm EST

Black Box Reading Series (Poetry, Fiction, etc)
Friday February 24, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Join us for an evening of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and drama at the Boston Playwrights' Theatre as BU's MFA fiction and poetry writers (and several alumni) read from their work. On the menu: poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and even a scene from a play. Light snacks and drinks will be served.

Friday February 24, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Boston Playwrights' Theatre 949 Commonwealth Avenue
 
Saturday, February 25
 

TBA

Joan Naviyuk Kane
Saturday February 25, 2023 TBA
Saturday February 25, 2023 TBA
MIT Stata Center

6:00pm EST

Bill Coyle
Saturday February 25, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Saturday February 25, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Amesbury Public Library

6:00pm EST

A Vocarium Reading: Natalie Diaz and Ocean Vuong
Saturday February 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Saturday February 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Menschell Hall Harvard Art Museums Quincy Street Cambridge

7:00pm EST

Martha Ackman
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Join us on Tuesday, February 25 at 7:00pm for a book talk and signing with Martha Ackmann, author of These Fevered Days: Ten Pivotal Moments in the Making of Emily Dickinson.

About the BookAn engaging, intimate portrait of Emily Dickinson, one of America’s greatest and most-mythologized poets, that sheds new light on her groundbreaking poetry.
On August 3, 1845, young Emily Dickinson declared, “All things are ready” and with this resolute statement, her life as a poet began. Despite spending her days almost entirely “at home” (the occupation listed on her death certificate), Dickinson’s interior world was extraordinary. She loved passionately, was hesitant about publication, embraced seclusion, and created 1,789 poems that she tucked into a dresser drawer.
In These Fevered Days, Martha Ackmann unravels the mysteries of Dickinson’s life through ten decisive episodes that distill her evolution as a poet. Ackmann follows Dickinson through her religious crisis while a student at Mount Holyoke, which prefigured her lifelong ambivalence toward organized religion and her deep, private spirituality. We see the poet through her exhilarating frenzy of composition, through which we come to understand her fiercely self-critical eye and her relationship with sister-in-law and first reader, Susan Dickinson. Contrary to her reputation as a recluse, Dickinson makes the startling decision to ask a famous editor for advice, writes anguished letters to an unidentified “Master,” and keeps up a lifelong friendship with writer Helen Hunt Jackson. At the peak of her literary productivity, she is seized with despair in confronting possible blindness.
Utilizing thousands of archival letters and poems as well as never-before-seen photos, These Fevered Days constructs a remarkable map of Emily Dickinson’s inner life. Together, these ten days provide new insights into her wildly original poetry and render a concise and vivid portrait of American literature’s most enigmatic figure.

About the AuthorMartha Ackmann, author of These Fevered Days, Curveball, and The Mercury 13, writes about women who have changed America. The recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, Ackmann taught a popular seminar on Dickinson at Mount Holyoke College and lives in western Massachusetts.

This event is free & open to the public.
Speakers
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
The Odyssey Bookshop

7:00pm EST

The Thirsty Lab Reading Series: John Hodgen
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
The Thirsty Lab Reading Series on 206 Worcester Road in Princeton, MA 01541. The series began in 2013 and happens the fourth and fifth Tuesdays of every month from 7-9 p.m. There is no open. The reader has the full two hours to use as s/he wishes. Some read two sets of 30-45 minutes. Some bring musicians to play behind the words.  Some use part of the time for a workshop session and discussion. There is usually a bottle of wine to share, some home baked treats, great discussion and a poetically intelligent audience. A list of readers scheduled for 2020 follows:
 
2020
 
January 28                                                     Michael Milligan
February 25                                                  John Hodgen
March 24                                                       Jenith Charpentier
March 31                                                       Jeffrey Levine
April 28                                                          Patrick Donnelly
May 26                                                           Kathleen Fagley
June 23                                                          Sarah St. George
June 30                                                          Susan Roney-O’Brien
July 28                                                           Susan Boucher
August 25                                                      Richard Fox
September 22                                              Elizabeth McKim
September 29                                              Heather McPherson
October 27                                                     Bruce Galli
November 24                                                 David Surette
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
206 Worcester Road 206 Worcester Road, Princeton, MA 01541

7:00pm EST

The Poetorium at Starlite Reading Series & Open Mic Featuring Ron Whittle
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Please join us on February 25th for our monthly open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite hosted by Paul Szlosek.. It will be a full evening of poetry and spoken word starting with a brief interview on stage with our featured poet Ron Whittle (Author of Goodbye Again, Postcards From a War Zone, & In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Grandson), followed by a poetry reading by our feature, a 10-minute tribute to a dead poet by a guest reader, a short intermission, and then the open mic (with 5-minute slots for each reader). Admission is free (but a hat will be passed to pay our features)
Moderators
Saturday February 25, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Starlite Bar & Gallery
 
Sunday, February 26
 

7:15pm EST

The Boston Poetry Slam features RLynn
Sunday February 26, 2023 7:15pm - 11:00pm EST
RLynn is a bartender, visual artist, and poet living in Boston. They’re a Pink Door alumnus, with work in Cosmonauts Ave., maps for teeth, and The Shallow Ends. You can follow them on Instagram.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge, with one flight of stairs to access the basement room (click for directions and accessibility information). Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.
Speakers
Sunday February 26, 2023 7:15pm - 11:00pm EST
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, February 27
 

6:00pm EST

African American History Month: Enzo Surin Poetry Reading & Workshop
Monday February 27, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Join Mass Poetry in welcoming Enzo Surin for a poetry reading and workshop.
Mr. Surin, a Haitian-born poet, educator, speaker, publisher and social
advocate, is the author of two chapbooks, A Letter of Resignation: An American
Libretto (2017) and Higher Ground. He is the recipient of a Brother Thomas
Fellowship from The Boston Foundation and is a PEN New England
Celebrated New Voice in Poetry. Surin’s work gives voice to experiences that
take place in what he calls “broken spaces”. Visit enzosurinink.org to learn
more.

To register, visit http://tiny.cc/5271iz or call the branch at 617-298-9218

Monday February 27, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Boston Public Library - Mattapan Branch 1350 Blue Hill Ave, Boston, MA 02126

6:00pm EST

Getting to the Point with Richard Blanco
Monday February 27, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EST
Presidential inaugural poet Richard Blanco will visit the Institute for a Getting to the Point discussion on the themes he explores in his recent poetry collection, How to Love a Country, and how Americans can find common ground through shared experiences and ideals.

Richard Blanco was the fifth presidential inaugural poet, serving as poet for President Obama’s second inauguration in 2013. He stands as the youngest, first Latino, immigrant, and gay person to serve in such a role. He is the author of four collections of poetry and three memoirs.

Mr. Blanco will perform a poetry reading as part of the program and will also participate in a book signing.

The event is free and attendees can register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/getting-to-the-point-with-richard-blanco-tickets-90788164845
Speakers
Monday February 27, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EST
Edward M. Kennedy Institute For the U.S. Senate

6:30pm EST

An Evening with Acclaimed Author Andres Debus III
Monday February 27, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
Come enjoy Tapas appetizers, drinks, and conversation in an intimate setting with novelist and short story writer Andre Dubus III.

Andre’s seven books include the New York Times’ bestsellers House of Sand and Fog, The Garden of Last Days, and his memoir, Townie. His most recent novel, Gone So Long, has received starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly and Library Journal and has been named on many “Best Books” lists, including selection for The Boston Globe’s “Twenty Best Books of 2018” and “The Best Books of 2018”, “Top 100”, Amazon.

Mr. Dubus has been a finalist for the National Book Award, and has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, The National Magazine Award for Fiction, two Pushcart Prizes, and is a recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature. His books are published in over twenty-five languages, and he teaches full-time at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Fontaine, a modern dancer, and their three children.

Tickets are $50, and all proceeds benefit the Gloucester Writers Center.
See website for details:
https://gloucesterwriters.org/event/an-evening-with-andre-dubus-iii/
Monday February 27, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA

7:00pm EST

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Monday February 27, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Monday February 27, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Roslindale House

8:00pm EST

Shayla Lawson @ Amherst Books
Monday February 27, 2023 8:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Shayla Lawson will read as part of the UMass Visiting Writers Series.   Lawson is the poet in residence at Amherst College.   She is author of the poetry collection, I Think I’m Ready to See Frank Ocean & the forthcoming collection of essays, This Is Major: Notes on Diana Ross, Dark Girls, & Being Dope.
Speakers
Monday February 27, 2023 8:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Amherst Books 8 Main Street, Amherst, MA

8:00pm EST

Visiting Writers Series: Shayla Lawson
Monday February 27, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
Shayla Lawson is the author of A Speed Education in Human Being, the chapbook PANTONE and I Think I’m Ready to see Frank Ocean—and the forthcoming essay collection THIS IS MAJOR (Harper Perennial, 2020). She is also co-curator of The Tenderness Project with Ross Gay. A MacDowell and Yaddo Artist Colony Fellow, Shayla Lawson is a member of The Affrilachian Poets & currently serves as Writer-in-Residence at Amherst College.
Speakers
Monday February 27, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EST
UMass Amherst, Great Hall Great Hall, Old Chapel, 144 Hicks Way, University of Massachusetts
 
Tuesday, February 28
 

7:00pm EST

An Evening With Richard Blanco
Tuesday February 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Brookline-Quezalguaque Sister City Project is very proud to present “An Evening With Richard Blanco” during which he will read his poetry and share his reflections. The evening will conclude with a book-signing. All proceeds from this event will be used for our Sister City in Nicaragua to fund projects in the areas of health, education, and more. Most currently, and thanks to generous grants from the Rotary in Brookline and Rotary International, we are engaged in an enormous and life-changing clean water initiative. This October will mark Brookline’s 33rd year anniversary of this Sister City relationship with Quezalguaque.

Tickets can be bought in advance for $25 at brooklinesistercity.org or by sending a check to BQSCP, PO Box 114, Brookline, MA 02446. There will be a list of attendees who have paid in advance at the door. Tickets at the door are $30. Sponsors donating $100 or more are invited to a private reception with Richard Blanco from 6 to 6:45 p.m.

Doors will open at 6:15 and on-street parking is available, but plan to arrive early as the event begins promptly at 7.
Speakers
Tuesday February 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Pierce Hall, First Parish in Brookline

7:00pm EST

Poetry Reading with Paul Szlosek and Eve Rifkah
Tuesday February 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Join us for this special reading of two local Worcester poets.

Paul Szlosek is a co-founder and host of both the former long-running Poet’s Parlor poetry venue and the recently-created open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite in Southbridge, MA, is a past recipient of the Jacob Knight Award for Poetry, and have taught poetry workshops in the galleries at the Worcester Art Museum,the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA. His poems have appeared in various local publications including the Worcester Review, Worcester Magazine, Sahara, Concrete Wolf, and Diner.He is probably best known in the Worcester area poetry community for his fanatical obsession with obscure poetry forms, and has invented his own including the ziggurat, the streetbeatina, and (most recently) the hodgenelle which he shares on his blog Paul’s Poetry Playground at playground.poetry.blog.


Eve Rifkah is author of “Dear Suzanne” (WordTech Communications, 2010) and “Outcasts the Penikese Leper Hospital 1905-1921” (Little Pear Press, 2010). Chapbook “Scar Tissue”, (Finishing Line Press, 2017), “At the Leprosarium” 2003 winner of the Revelever Chapbook Contest.



Tuesday February 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Bedlam Book Cafe
 
Wednesday, March 1
 

2:00pm EST

Open Mic Poetry
Wednesday March 1, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
TBA
Bring original or favorite poetry to share in a round robin style. Free and open to the public. Space is limited. To sign up to read call 508-949-6232 or email deb@bookloversgourmet.com

Wednesday March 1, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
TBA
 
Friday, March 3
 

6:00pm EST

Marie Howe
Friday March 3, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Friday March 3, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EST
Tufts University

7:00pm EST

Boston Poetry Out Loud Semi-Finals
Friday March 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:30pm EST
Poetry Out Loud is a national recitation contest that celebrates the power of the spoken word and a mastery of public speaking skills while cultivating self-confidence and an appreciation of students’ literary heritage as they take poetry from the page to the stage. Celebrating 15 years in 2020, Poetry Out Loud has inspired hundreds of thousands of high school students to discover and appreciate both classic and contemporary poetry.

For more information on Poetry Out Loud, visit the official website at poetryoutloud.org. For information about the Massachusetts contests, please contact Meg O'Brien, Director of Education at poetryoutloud@huntingtontheatre.org.

The Boston Semi-Final will be held at the Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA, 527 Tremont Street, Boston, MA.

Poetry Out Loud is a national program run by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation. The Huntington Theatre Company's Education Department, in partnership with the Mass Cultural Council, are proud to facilitate Poetry Out Loud for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 

**All contests are free and open to the public.
**Ending time for event is approximate
Friday March 3, 2023 7:00pm - 9:30pm EST
Huntington Theatre Company 264 Huntington Avenue, Boston MA 02115

7:30pm EST

Monthly Open Mic!
Friday March 3, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EST
TBA
The first Monday of (almost) every month, the Gloucester Writers Center hosts an Open Mic! Come read your written work in what was once the home of Gloucester poet Vincent Ferrini. Now a home – of sorts – to writers everywhere.

Bring your words. Get Heard.

5 minutes each.

Free to attend.

Donations are much appreciated, and help us keep our lights on and our programs running

Friday March 3, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EST
TBA
 
Sunday, March 5
 

7:00pm EST

WCPA Board Meeting for March 2020
Sunday March 5, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Join the board of the Worcester County Poetry Association for our monthly meeting. This is a working meeting, not a poetry reading. We welcome to the respectful input of the poetry community.

This is a great opportunity to learn more about how the board supports the rich literary history and creative energy of Central Massachusetts.

#poetryofworcestercounty



Sunday March 5, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
WCPA Office @ the Sprinkler Factory 38 Harlow Street, Worcester, MA 01605

7:15pm EST

Boston Poetry Slam featuring Susanna Kitrredge
Sunday March 5, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EST
Susanna Kittredge is a schoolteacher and poet from the Boston area. She belongs to the Jamaica Pond Poets, a weekly workshop group that includes several psychologists, a candy-maker, and multiple feisty old ladies. She is also a regular participant at the Brighton Word Factory, a super fun bi-weekly collaborative writing party. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Susanna is thrilled to announce that her first full-length poetry collection, The Future Has a Reputation, was published by CW Books in January, 2020! You can find links to her work at her website.

An open poetry slam is scheduled for the late-night portion of this show, following the feature. The slam will be speed slam format: eight open sign-ups will be available starting at door time, and poets will slam head-to-head in up to three rounds with time limits of 3, 2, and 1 minute. Winner and runner-up qualify for the 2020 Team Selection series. To volunteer to judge in exchange for free admission to the show, or to ask questions about the slam, email the slam curator at slamseries@bostonpoetryslam.com.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge, with one flight of stairs to access the basement room (click for directions and accessibility information). Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00, with the poetry slam to follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.
Exhibitors
Sunday March 5, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EST
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, March 6
 

5:00pm EST

Amherst Arts Night Plus Open Mic and Features
Monday March 6, 2023 5:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Monthly Amherst Arts Night Plus at the Emily Dickinson Museum celebrates contemporary art and poetry in our historic setting. From 5:00 – 8:00 p.m., view the pop-up, contemporary art exhibition in the Homestead by our monthly featured artist. Poets, writers, and performers of any kind are welcome to share work at our open mic, which begins at 6:00 p.m. Stay after the open mic for the featured reader of the month. Open mic sign-ups are between 5:00 and 6:00 p.m. This program is free and open to the public.

Featured Poet: Karen Skolfield

Karen Skolfield’s book Battle Dress (W. W. Norton, 2019) won the Barnard Women Poets Prize. Her book Frost in the Low Areas (Zone 3 Press) won the 2014 PEN New England Award in poetry and the First Book Award from Zone 3 Press and is a Massachusetts “Must Read” selection. She is the poet laureate for Northampton, Massachusetts, for 2019-2021.

Skolfield is the winner of the 2016 Jeffrey E. Smith Editors’ Prize in poetry from The Missouri Review, the 2015 Robert H. Winner Award from the Poetry Society of America, and the 2015 Arts & Humanities Award from New England Public Radio. She’s received fellowships and awards from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Split This Rock, Ucross Foundation, Hedgebrook, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Vermont Studio Center. Skolfield is a U.S. Army veteran and teaches writing to engineers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she earned her Master of Fine Arts.
Monday March 6, 2023 5:00pm - 8:00pm EST
The Emily Dickinson Museum

5:30pm EST

 
Tuesday, March 7
 

7:00pm EST

Poetry at the Y Series ft. Timothy Gager and Sarah Snyder
Tuesday March 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Speakers
Tuesday March 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
West Suburban YMCA

7:00pm EST

Deep Thoughts Poetry Open Mic (first Friday of every month)
Tuesday March 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Join us the first Friday of every month for an open mic poetry reading. Arrive at 6:30 to sign up for a 5-minute slot, and grab something to drink or snack on at the cafe. Reading starts promptly at 7.



Tuesday March 7, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Bedlam Book Cafe
 
Wednesday, March 8
 

4:30pm EST

 
Saturday, March 11
 

7:00pm EST

Poetry Reading and Open Mike
Saturday March 11, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
This year’s Poetry Series continues with readings by Wyn Cooper, Nausheen Eusuf and Michael Steffen. An open mike will follow with a limit of one poem per person. Come early to sign up for the open mike; limited slots are available, time permitting. The series is facilitated by Doug Holder of Ibbetson Street Press. Info contact: Doug at dougholder@post.harvard.edu.

Saturday March 11, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Newton Free Library

7:30pm EST

Jericho Brown @ the Poetry Center
Saturday March 11, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
In his third and most recent collection, The Tradition (Copper Canyon Press, 2019), JERICHO BROWN focuses his attention on the black queer body, bringing both terror and beauty to the fore in his formally inventive poems. Maya Phillips writes, “In Brown’s poems, the body at risk — the infected body, the abused body, the black body, the body in eros — is most vulnerable to the cruelty of the world.” The Tradition (a finalist for the 2019 National Book Award) is preceded by The New Testament (Copper Canyon Press, 2014) and Please (New Issues Press, 2008). Brown’s poems have appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, and several volumes of The Best American Poetry. He is a recipient of a Whiting Award, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Brown is an associate professor and director of the Creative Writing Program at Emory University.
 Co-Sponsored by the Smith College Lecture Committee, the Department of Africana Studies, the Department of English Language and Literature, and the Program for the Study of Women and Gender.
All of our main schedule readings are free and open to the public and begin at 7:30 p.m. Books can be purchased onsite and signings follow the readings.



Speakers
Saturday March 11, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Weinstein Auditorium, Smith College
 
Sunday, March 12
 

1:00pm EDT

A Reading and Q&A with Martín Espada, a World Poetry series event
Sunday March 12, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Martín Espada has published more than twenty books as a poet, editor, essayist and translator. His latest collection of poems from Norton is called Vivas to Those Who Have Failed (2016). He is the editor of What Saves Us: Poems of Empathy and Outrage in the Age Trump (2019). His many honors include the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Shelley Memorial Award, the Robert Creeley Award, the National Hispanic Cultural Center Literary Award, an American Book Award, an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, the PEN/Revson Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship. His book of poems, The Republic of Poetry, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. A former tenant lawyer in Greater Boston’s Latinx community, Espada is a professor of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

Sunday March 12, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Massasoit Community College

6:00pm EDT

Curt Curtin and Judy Ferrara
Sunday March 12, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Worcester poets Judy Ferrara and Curt Curtin will read their work.
Exhibitors
Sunday March 12, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Bedlam Book Cafe

7:00pm EDT

Poetry Reading with Curt Curtin and Judy Ferrara
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join us for an evening of poetry with two local Worcester poets, Curt Curtin and Judith Ferrara.

Curt Curtin will be reading from his newly published book "For Art's Sake." Curt Curtin is a lifelong poet with three self-produced chapbooks and many individual poems appearing in journals and other publications. In 2005 he was the recipient of the Jacob Knight Poetry Award and in 2010 received the Frank O’Hara award for poetry. In 2019 he won second place in the annual contest of the Connecticut Poetry Society, and two other poems were selected for publication in an Irish anthology, Writing Home: The ‘New Irish’ Poets, released in October 2019 by Dedalus Press. Curt has been a featured reader in many poetry venues in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and once in Limerick, Ireland. He also taught college English and creative writing at Westfield State University for 20 years. For Art’s Sake is his first full-length collection.

Writer and visual artist Judith Ferrara lives in Worcester, Massachusetts. In 2003, she received
a Creative Arts Fellowship from the Worcester Cultural Commission/Massachusetts Cultural
Council to work on her artist’s book, RECIPROCITY: POEMS AND PAINTINGS. Her poetry and
essays have been published in three collections: GESTURES OF TREES (2000), A BRUSH WITH
WORDS (2013) and THE LITTLE O, THE EARTH: TRAVEL JOURNALS, ART & POEMS (2015), and in journals such as the black fly review, The Comstock Review, The Portland Review Literary
Journal, GSU Review and The Worcester Review. In 2009, she began a study of poet Stanley
Kunitz and continues to do research on his life and poems. In 2018, Ferrara received the Stanley
Kunitz Medal for her lifelong contributions to poetry. Since 1998, Ferrara’s art has been shown
in group and solo exhibitions. Please visit www.PaletteAndPen.com to see more of her artwork
and read the complete collection of Judy’s Journals, a monthly blog about the creative process,
which she has written since 2004.



Speakers
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Bedlam Book Cafe

7:15pm EDT

Boston Poetry Slam featuring Adam Falkner
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EDT
Dr. Adam Falkner is a poet, educator and arts & culture strategist. He is the author of Adoption (winner of the 2017 Diode Editions Chapbook Award) and The Willies (Button Poetry, 2020), and his work has appeared in a range of print and media spaces including on programming for HBO, NBC, NPR, BET, in the New York Times, and elsewhere. A former high school English teacher in New York City’s public schools, Adam is the Founder and Executive Director of the pioneering diversity consulting initiative, the Dialogue Arts Project, in which capacity he develops and facilitates trainings for schools, companies and cultural institutions across the nation. Adam has toured the United States as a guest artist, lecturer and consultant for thousands of students, educators and corporate employees, and was the featured performer at President Obama’s Grassroots Ball at the 2009 Presidential Inauguration. He holds a Ph.D. in English and Education from Columbia University.

An open poetry slam is scheduled for the late-night portion of this show, following the feature. The slam will be speed slam format: eight open sign-ups will be available starting at door time, and poets will slam head-to-head in up to three rounds with time limits of 3, 2, and 1 minute. Winner and runner-up qualify for the 2020 Team Selection series. To volunteer to judge in exchange for free admission to the show, or to ask questions about the slam, email the slam curator at slamseries@bostonpoetryslam.com.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge, with one flight of stairs to access the basement room (click for directions and accessibility information). Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00, with the poetry slam to follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.
Speakers Exhibitors
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EDT
Cantab Lounge

7:30pm EDT

A Reading from spoKe six
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EDT
TBA
A reading from spoKe six including David Rich reading from his essay on Gerrit Lansing, James Cook reading from his essay on Sam Cornish, poems by John Mulrooney, Jim Dunn and Amanda Cook. Hosted by Karina Van Berkum and Kevin Gallagher.

David Rich worked as the poet Gerrit Lansing’s archivist from 2017 to 2018, and as archivist for Lansing’s estate from 2018 to 2019. He co-edited and wrote the postscript for Arcana: A Stephen Jonas Reader (City Lights, 2019) and edited Charles Olson: Letters Home, 1949 – 1969 (Cape Ann Museum, 2010). He studied archaeology at Boston University and theology at Harvard Divinity School. Rich’s poems and essays have appeared in literary magazines such as The Doris, Kadar Koli, Let the Bucket Down, No Infinite, Rain Taxi and Polis.


Amanda Cook lives in Gloucester with her husband, James, and children Abigail and Samuel. She sees writing as an integral part of life. She knits, spins yarn, plays fiddle, feeds people and dances when she pleases. She teaches and works at the Gloucester Writers Center. Her book, Ironstone Whirlygig, was published by Bootstrap Press in 2017.


James Cook signifies and represents in Gloucester, Massachusetts. He fathers-forth but presents change. He husbands. He has worked in high school education for more than twenty years. He has been the co-editor of the literary magazine Polis, and his work has appeared in Wards of the Wards, Let the Bucket Down, Jacket2, Process, Gaff, and Underutilized Species


Jim Dunn is a poet and author of Soft Launch (Bootstrap, 2008), Convenient Hole (Pressed Wafer, 2004), and Insects In Sex (Falling Angel Press, 1995). His work has appeared in several publications, including spoKe, Polis, Bright Pink Mosquito, The Process, eoagh, Gerry Mulligan, Cafe Review, and The Battersea Review. He edited the poet John Wieners’ journal, A New Book From Rome, with Derek Fenner and Ryan Gallagher of Bootstrap Press.


John Mulrooney is a poet, filmmaker and musician living in Cambridge, MA. He is author of If You See Something, Say Something from the Anchorite Press and co-producer of the documentary The Peacemaker, from Central Square Films. He serves as poetry editor for Boog City. He records and performs regularly with a number of musical groups in the greater Boston area. He is Associate Professor in the English department at Bridgewater State University. His work has appeared in Fulcrum, Pressed Wafer fold’em zine, Solstice, the Battersea Review, Poetry Northeast, spoKe, Let the Bucket Down and others.
 
Sunday March 12, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EDT
TBA

8:00pm EDT

Fatimah Asghar and Franny Choi: Poetry and Conversation
Sunday March 12, 2023 8:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The poets Fatimah Asghar and Franny Choi will read from their work and talk about poetry on Wednesday, March 11th, at 8 p.m. at Amherst Books (8 Main Street). The event, sponsored by the Amherst College Creative Writing Center, is free and open to the public and will be followed by refreshments. 

Asghar is poet, filmmaker, educator and performer, as well as the creator of the Emmy-nominated Web series Brown Girls. She is the author of the poetry collection If They Come For Us and the co-editor of Halal If You Hear Me, an anthology celebrating Muslim writers who are also women, queer, gender nonconforming and/or trans. Choi is the author of two poetry collections, Soft Science, which Monica Youn called “raw and radiant” and Floating, Brilliant, Gone. She edits for Hyphen Magazine and co-hosts the podcast VS alongside fellow Dark Noise Collective member Danez Smith.
Sunday March 12, 2023 8:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Amherst Books 8 Main Street, Amherst, MA
 
Tuesday, March 14
 

7:00pm EDT

Matthew Lippman and Jacob Strautmann
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Brookline Booksmith

7:00pm EDT

Adam Falkner reading, "The Willies"
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
TBA
Dr. Adam Falkner is a poet, educator and arts & culture strategist. He is the author of "Adoption" (Winner of the 2017 Diode Editions Chapbook Award) and "The Willies" (forthcoming from Button Poetry, 2020), and his work has appeared in a range of print and media spaces including on programming for HBO, NBC, NPR, BET, in the New York Times, and elsewhere.

A former high school English teacher in New York City’s public schools, Adam is the Founder and Executive Director of the pioneering diversity consulting initiative, the Dialogue Arts Project, and Special Projects Director for Urban Word NYC, in which capacity he oversees the New York City Youth Poet Laureate program, and the organization’s partnerships with corporate and cultural institutions across the country. Adam has toured the United States as a guest artist, lecturer and trainer for thousands of students, educators and culture workers, and was the featured performer at President Obama’s Grassroots Ball at the 2009 Presidential Inauguration. He holds a Ph.D. in English and Education from Columbia University.
Speakers
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
TBA

7:30pm EDT

CANCELED - Chapter and Verse Literary Reading Series
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
TBA
hapter and Verse is a free literary reading series sponsored by the Jamaica Pond Poets, usually on the second Friday of the month, from October through May. The events take place at the Loring Greenough House in Jamaica Plain at 7:30 PM. The operating committee members are  Dorothy Derifield, Sandra Storey, Susanna Kittridge, Jennifer Markell, and Alan Smith Soto
There are three readers followed by free refreshments. Open to all. Please join us. A $5.00 donation is requested but not required.For more information, contact dorothy.derifield@gmail.com
Tuesday March 14, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
TBA
 
Wednesday, March 15
 

7:00pm EDT

LGBTQ+ Lowell Open Mic
Wednesday March 15, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
 Come on down to the cafe for a night celebrating local LGBTQ+ talent. Whether you're an amateur or a seasoned professional we want to hear your songs, stories, and poems, see your dance routines, and laugh til our sides hurt at your stand up bits. Emcee Resi Ibañez is a Filipinx genderqueer poet, writer, and community storyteller, who believes in storytelling as a way of building community. They have been published in bklyn boihood’s Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity, LOAM magazine, and will soon be published in Blue Oak Press’s upcoming anthology They Rise Like a Wave: an Anthology of Asian American Woman Poets, as well as Loom Press’s Atlantic Currents: Connecting Cork and Lowell. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/1770488649764214/ .
Exhibitors
Wednesday March 15, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852

7:00pm EDT

Poetic Recovery
Wednesday March 15, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Are you a socially conscious hip-hop artist or poet who is looking to inspire, be inspired and collaborate with other like-minded individuals like yourself? Join us for this monthly Poetic Recovery workshop every 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month to share our own work within a supportive community. We will discuss artistic consciousness, different aspects of the cultural work, and the possibilities that potentially await you.
Bring something to write with, something to write on and you.
Suggested donation is $10.00.
--
The workshop host, Maurice Taylor, is an East Coast director of hip-hop congress and has been organizing open mics, poetry slams and hip-hop workshops for over 20 years. Maurice “Soulfighter” Taylor set out in 2006 to create Poetic Recovery as a platform to give voice to artists in recovery. It is a collection of cultural and educational activities that facilitate the nurturing of artists towards higher consciousness. These activities allow artists to reflect and perform for audiences from communities effected by traumatic experiences. These shared energies will help facilitate a cultural healing process between artists and community to recover of our cultural identity appropriated and exploited by the music industry that has resulted in cultural genocide.
Speakers
Wednesday March 15, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Make-It Springfield 168 Worthington Street Springfield, MA 01103
 
Saturday, March 18
 

7:00pm EDT

CANCELLED - David Ferry
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Suffolk University Poetry Center

7:00pm EDT

Poets & Plants
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Pemberton Farms

7:00pm EDT

March U35 Reading Series
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
U35 is a bi-monthly reading series for poets under 35, held once each January, March, May, July, September, and November. The series seeks to promote and bolster young Massachusetts poets while giving them a venue to share their work and connect with other poets. If you are a poet under the age of 35, sign up to read via Mass Poetry's website! This event is free and open to the public. 

http://www.masspoetry.org/u35

Our March readers are:

Emily Duggan is interested in work — and play! — at the intersection of the performing/expressive arts and individual and community healing. To that end, they create and perform poetry, experimental theater, and improv, sketch, and stand-up comedy. In the recent past, they have: acted and written with various performance troupes in Roslindale; appeared as a featured poet for the Boston Poetry Slam; enjoyed a stint as an ensemble member at Chicago's Green Mill; and haunted graveyards as a ghost-tour guide. Lately, they partner with Writers Without Margins, bringing writing beyond conventional spaces, and they served as Mass Poetry's Development Intern last spring.

Egan Millard has worked as a journalist in Alaska, Maine and New York City, where he grew up. His poetry has appeared in The Worcester Review, Cirque, The Aurorean (featured poet, Spring/Summer 2019), and “Building Fires in the Snow” (University of Alaska Press, 2016), the first-ever anthology of LGBTQ Alaskan writers, and is forthcoming in "From the Farther Shore: Discovering Cape Cod and the Islands Through Poetry" (Bass River Press, 2020). His chapbook "Interstate" is available from Harvard Book Store. He now lives in Boston, where he works as a reporter and editor.

Sarah O'Brien loves dark chocolate and light wordplay. Sarah is the author of the poetry book Shapeshifter and she is Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Boston Accent Lit, a literary journal and press. She earned her MFA in Poetry at the University of Nebraska-Omaha. Sarah has been published in places such as Allegro Poetry Magazine, Elbow Room, Helen Literary Magazine, Homology Lit, and The Flat Water Stirs: An Anthology of Emerging Nebraska Poets. She was runner-up for the 2018 Helen W. Kenefick Academy of American Poets prize with her poem "School of Love." Sarah is active in the writing community; she often reads work at The Bebop or Cantab Lounge and she volunteers at Grub Street's Muse & the Marketplace and Mass Poetry's annual Poetry Festival. Learn more at www.sarahobrien.org

Georgia Park is a contributing editor of Sudden Denouement, founder of Whisper and the Roar, and author of Quit Your Job and Become a Poet (Out of Spite). She dropped out of high school in 2004 and earned her Master’s degree with an emphasis on creative writing in 2019. She is currently teaching English and ESL at the college level. She has been published in several literary magazines, most recently, The Offbeat and Soundings East. Her work has also been featured in several books, including We Will Not Be Silenced, All the Lonely People, Smitten, and Anthology Volume l: Writings from the Sudden Denouement Literary Collective. Georgia has been asked to speak about her poetry at several educational institutions, including Boston University. Georgia's current book, titled Softly Glowing Exit Signs, is an autobiography written in poetry that covers her time in Korea and her journey from dysfunctional childhood to semi-functional adulthood.
Saturday March 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Trident Booksellers & Cafe
 
Sunday, March 19
 

7:15pm EDT

Boston Poetry Slam featuring Lip Manegio
Sunday March 19, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EDT
Lip Manegio (they/them) is a Pushcart nominated writer, organizer, & cryptid who is learning to be unapologetically in love with life. They are currently pursuing a BFA in creative writing with a minor in art history at Emerson College, where they also serve as co-president of the Emerson Poetry Project.

They represented Emerson at CUPSI 2018 & 2019, have appeared on finals stages at FEMS & Capturing Fire, and were on the winning team at Vox Pop 2018. Their work has appeared in Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Puerto del Sol, tenderness lit, Gordon Square Review, Tin House, and elsewhere. Their debut chapbook, We’ve All Seen Helena, a collection of poems about queerness, survival, & My Chemical Romance, is available now from Game Over Books.

An open poetry slam is scheduled for the late-night portion of this show, following the feature. The slam will be speed slam format: eight open sign-ups will be available starting at door time, and poets will slam head-to-head in up to three rounds with time limits of 3, 2, and 1 minute. Winner and runner-up qualify for the 2020 Team Selection series. To volunteer to judge in exchange for free admission to the show, or to ask questions about the slam, email the slam curator at slamseries@bostonpoetryslam.com.

This show in our weekly Wednesday series takes place at the Cantab Lounge, 738 Massachusetts Ave. in Cambridge, with one flight of stairs to access the basement room (click for directions and accessibility information). Doors for the show open at 7:15. The open mic begins at 8:00 and the feature performs at approximately 10:00, with the poetry slam to follow. The show is 18+ (ID required) and the cover charge is $3.
Speakers Exhibitors
Sunday March 19, 2023 7:15pm - 11:30pm EDT
Cantab Lounge
 
Monday, March 20
 

5:30pm EDT

CANCELLED - Poetry Night
Monday March 20, 2023 5:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
A Timilty Middle School event, in partnership with Roxbury Heritage State Park and MassPoetry. 

Please join us for a night of Community and Poetry at the Dillaway-Thomas House.

Dinner 5:30 pm - 6:30 pm
Poetry Reading  6:30 pm - 8:30pm

Featured poets include: Charles Coe, Ashley-Rose, Imani Powell, and Boston Youth Poet Laureate Finalist Norah Brady. Musical entertainment by Savoir Faire.

Free food & childcare provided. All students must attend with a parent or guardian. Tickets available at Eventbrite starting March 2.
Monday March 20, 2023 5:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Roxbury Heritage State Park
 
Wednesday, March 22
 

10:00am EDT

Community Poetry Experience! Round 3
Wednesday March 22, 2023 10:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Calling All Poets … and everyone interested in poetry and the spoken word … EXPRESS YOURSELF!

Welcome to the Westfield Community Poetry Experience, a series of monthly open mic poetry events and experiences leading up to the celebration of National Poetry Month in April. 

These events are FREE and open to all. This event is the third open mic event in this series and is also part of our Art In Unusual Places series launched in December 2019.

One theme of this event is welcoming the Vernal Equinox ... springtime and all the signs of renewal it brings!

Write, read or just stop by and listen! Watch for writing prompts for each session on Facebook, inspired and motivated by art work by local and regional artists to stimulate written works and discussion. 

Write. Read. Share. Listen. You’re invited …
Wednesday March 22, 2023 10:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Olver Transit Pavillion

7:00pm EDT

Solidarity Salon
Wednesday March 22, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The Solidarity Salon features a variety of creative artists who are women, people of color, immigrants, LGBTQ and/or differently-abled. Admission is free but donations are accepted. The donations recipient for our March 21 event will be Abilities Dance Boston.
Wednesday March 22, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The Community Church of Boston
 
Thursday, March 23
 

3:00pm EDT

John Mulrooney and Danielle Legros Georges @ Xit the Bear Reading Series
Thursday March 23, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Speakers
Thursday March 23, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The Press Room
 
Friday, March 24
 

6:00pm EDT

Poetry Reading by Mary Szybist
Friday March 24, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Mary Szybist is the author of Incarnadine (Graywolf Press, 2013), winner of the 2013 National Book Award for Poetry, and Granted (Alice James Books, 2003), winner of the 2003 Beatrice Hawley Award from Alice James Books and the 2004 Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award. She is also the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rona Jaffe Foundation, and the Witter Bynner Foundation. She teaches at Lewis & Clark College and lives in Portland, Oregon.

Speakers
Friday March 24, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Katzenberg Center, 3rd floor, CGS

7:00pm EDT

Nixes Mate Poetry Reading/Book Launch
Friday March 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Nixes Mate is a navigational hazard in Boston Harbor. 42° 19' 47.9" North · 70° 56' 43.9" West
They want to challenge the preconceived notions of reading on the web by using off-the-shelf technology to build a best-in-breed literary magazine. More than a magazine, it's a website. They feature small-batch artisanal literature, created by writers who've been honing their craft the time-honored way: one line at a time.
About the Authors
David P. Miller’s chapbook, The Afterimages, was published by Červená Barva Press. He received degrees in theater at the University of Massachusetts/Amherst and Emerson College, and librarianship from Simmons College. For twenty-five years, he was a member of the Mobius Artists Group of Boston, creating his own performance art pieces and collaborating on performances of original experimental work, as well as pieces by John Cage, Gertrude Stein, and Jackson Mac Low. In 2018, he retired from Curry College in Milton, Massachusetts, where he was a librarian for twenty-six years. A resident of Boston since 1978, he lives in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood with his wife, the visual artist Jane Wiley.
Brad Rose was born and raised in Los Angeles and lives in Boston. He is the author of a collection of poetry and flash fiction, Pink X-Ray (Big Table Publishing, 2015, http://pinkx-ray.com and Amazon.com.) His two new books of poems, Momentary Turbulence and WordinEdgeWise, are forthcoming from Cervena Barva Press. Brad is also the author of five chapbooks of poetry and flash fiction, Democracy of Secrets, Coyotes Circle the Party Store, Dancing School Nerves, An Evil Twin is Always in Good Companyand Away with Words. Three times nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and once nominated for Best of the Net Anthology, Brad’s poetry and micro fiction have appeared in, The American Journal of Poetry, The Los Angeles Times, Folio, decomP, Lunch Ticket, The Baltimore ReviewPositOff the Coast, Clockhouse, and other publications.


Event date:
Monday, March 23, 2020 - 7:00pm


Event address:
338 Newbury Street
Boston, MA 02115
Speakers
Friday March 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Trident Bookstore
 
Saturday, March 25
 

6:00pm EDT

Amesbury Monthly Poetry Reading
Saturday March 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Our next Monthly Poetry Reading will feature Eve Linn on Tuesday, March 24 at 6 p.m.. We will be meeting, for the first time at the Amesbury Senior Center at 68 Elm St.
Eve F.W. Linn received her B.A. cum laude from Smith College in Fine Art and her M.F.A. in Poetry from the Low Residency Program at Lesley University. She has attended the Bread Loaf Writer's Conference, the Frost Place Conference on Poetry, and the Colrain Poetry Manuscript Conference. She is a published poet and book reviewer. Her first chapbook, Model Home (July 2019) is available from River Glass Books. Her favorite color is blue. She collects antique baby shoes, vintage textiles, and art pottery. She lives west of Boston with her family and one demanding feline.

Our featured reading is followed by a brief question and answer period and then an open mic.
Speakers
Saturday March 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Amesbury Senior Center

7:00pm EDT

The Thirsty Lab Reading Series: Jenith Charpentier
Saturday March 25, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The Thirsty Lab Reading Series on 206 Worcester Road in Princeton, MA 01541. The series began in 2013 and happens the fourth and fifth Tuesdays of every month from 7-9 p.m. There is no open. The reader has the full two hours to use as s/he wishes. Some read two sets of 30-45 minutes. Some bring musicians to play behind the words.  Some use part of the time for a workshop session and discussion. There is usually a bottle of wine to share, some home baked treats, great discussion and a poetically intelligent audience. A list of readers scheduled for 2020 follows:
 
2020
 
January 28                                                     Michael Milligan
February 25                                                  John Hodgen
March 24                                                       Jenith Charpentier
March 31                                                       Jeffrey Levine
April 28                                                          Patrick Donnelly
May 26                                                           Kathleen Fagley
June 23                                                          Sarah St. George
June 30                                                          Susan Roney-O’Brien
July 28                               Susan Boucher
August 25                                                      Richard Fox
September 22                                              Elizabeth McKim
September 29                                              Heather McPherson
October 27                                                     Bruce Galli
November 24                             David Surette
Saturday March 25, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
206 Worcester Road 206 Worcester Road, Princeton, MA 01541
 
Sunday, March 26
 

7:00pm EDT

Poetry Reading with Jason Tandon
Sunday March 26, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join us for Jason Tandon's reading of his new book of poetry, The Actual World. Born in Hartford, CT in 1975, Jason Tandon is the author of four books of poetry, including The Actual World, Quality of Life, and Give over the Heckler and Everyone Gets Hurt, winner of the St. Lawrence Book Award from Black Lawrence Press. His poems have appeared in Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, Beloit Poetry Journal, AGNI Online, Barrow Street, and Esquire, among others. He earned his B.A. and M.A. from Middlebury College, and his M.F.A. from the University of New Hampshire, where he studied with Charles Simic. Since 2008, he has taught in the Arts & Sciences Writing Program at Boston University.
Speakers
Sunday March 26, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Bedlam Book Cafe
 
Monday, March 27
 

5:00pm EDT

Author Talks: Cameron Awkward-Rich
Monday March 27, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Cameron Awkward-Rich is an assistant professor of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is the author of two poetry collections – Sympathetic Little Monster (2016), which was a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award, and Dispatch (2019), winner of the 2019 Lexi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Award. A Cave Canem fellow, his poetry has been published in Poetry, American Poetry Review, the Academy of American Poet's Poem A Day series, and elsewhere, and his critical writing can be found in Signs, Science Fiction Studies, American Quarterly, Transgender Studies Quarterly. 

Directions:http://www.library.umass.edu/locations/
Monday March 27, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Library, W.E.B. Du Bois Room: 2601 UMass Amherst Campus Library, W.E.B. Du Bois Room: 2601 UMass Amherst Campus

7:00pm EDT

Evening of Inspired Leaders 2020
Monday March 27, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Evening of Inspired Leaders–a fundraiser to benefit Mass Poetry–highlights the power of poetry to inspire and delight while showcasing an all-star field of leaders. Inspired by Robert Pinsky’s Favorite Poem Project, this event brings exemplary leaders in diverse fields together to read a poem that is meaningful to them and discuss its influence on their life and work.

You can support Mass Poetry by purchasing a VIP package (by March 1st) to join us at the dessert reception in Huntington Theatre's Studio 210 following the event! Become a sponsor here: 
http://www.masspoetry.org/inspiredleaderssponsor

Ticketing will open shortly! Check back for the link and more info. 

Speakers for Evening of Inspired Leaders 2020 include: 
- Mohamad Ali, CEO of International Data Group Inc.
- Andrew Bacevich, Writer & President of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
- Meghna Chakrabarti, Host of WBUR's OnPoint
- Vikiana Petit-Homme, Regional Organizer, March for Our Lives
- Darrell Jones, Strongest Link Community Activist 
- Dr. Anne Klibanski, President and CEO of Mass General Brigham
- Julia Mejia, Boston City Councilor 
- Rachael Rollins, Suffolk County District Attorney 
- Yusufi Vali, Director, Mayor's Office for Immigrant Advancement
- Bina Venkataraman, Boston Globe Editorial Page Editor 
- David Waters, CEO of Community Servings
Monday March 27, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Huntington Theatre Company 264 Huntington Avenue, Boston MA 02115

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Monday March 27, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
 Kathleen McCann lives in Weymouth, Massachusetts, by the sea. She has two chapbooks: The Small Hours, and The Sea’s Rosary in print and two full-length collections: A Roof Gone To Sky, and Barn Sour. New poems are forthcoming in Poetry Ireland and New American Writing. One of her poems, Lone Egret, was selected by Ted Kooser for his syndicated newspaper column: American Life in Poetry.
David P. Miller’s collection, Sprawled Asleep, was published by Nixes Mate Books in 2019. Poems have recently appeared in Meat for Tea, Hawaii Pacific Review, Turtle Island Quarterly, Clementine Unbound, Constellations, J Journal, The Lily Poetry Review, Unlost, Ibbetson Street, and What Rough Beast. His poem “Add One Father to Earth” was awarded an Honorable Mention by Robert Pinsky for the New England Poetry Club's 2019 Samuel Washington Allen Prize competition
Speakers
Monday March 27, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Roslindale House
 
Wednesday, March 29
 

4:00pm EDT

Alec Solomita and Philip Nikolayev
Wednesday March 29, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Wednesday March 29, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Outpost 186

4:00pm EDT

The Liminal Reading Series
Wednesday March 29, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Alysia Abbott reads Steve Abbott and Jim Cory reads Karl Tierney
Wednesday March 29, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
MIT Press Bookstore

6:00pm EDT

IAWA Open Mic and Featured Reading
Wednesday March 29, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Wednesday March 29, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
I Am Books
 
Thursday, March 30
 

6:00pm EDT

He Dreams of Giants
Thursday March 30, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT
The GWC is a community Partner with Salem Film Festival again this year...

The Guardian says, “…a moody plunge into the anguish of the artistic process…By the end of this movie you’ll realize
that Gilliam’s struggles are humanity’s struggles.”

In 2000, when he Terry Gilliam first attempted a screen adaptation of Cervantes’ masterpiece, Don Quixote de la Mancha, the film director already had a Quixotic reputation: a filmmaker whose stories of visionary dreamers raging against gigantic forces mirrored his own battles with the Hollywood machine. HE DREAMS OF GIANTS picks up Gilliam’s story 17 years later as he mounts the production again. He struggles with budget constraints and heightened expectations compounded by doubt, the toll of aging, and the nagging existential question: What is left for an artist when he completes this career defining quest? Immersive verité footage of Gilliam’s production combined with interviews and archival footage reveals a character study of this late-career artist, and a meditation on the value of creativity in the face of mortality.
Thursday March 30, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT
The Historic Cabot Theatre 286 Cabot Street, Beverly MA
 
Friday, March 31
 

6:00pm EDT

Irish Voices: Poetry Reading by Alan Gillis and David Wheatley
Friday March 31, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Alan Gillis teaches creative writing as well as modern and contemporary poetry at the University of Edinburgh. Alan Gillis's books of poetry include Somebody, Somewhere (2004), Hawks and Doves (2007), which was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize, and Scapegoat (2014), all published by The Gallery Press. As a critic, he is author of Irish Poetry of the 1930s (Oxford University Press, 2005). Gillis co-edited The Oxford Handbook of Modern Irish Poetry (OUP, 2011) with Fran Brearton. He was the editor of Edinburgh Review from 2010 to 2015.

David Wheatley was born in Dublin and is the author of five poetry collections with The Gallery Press, including A Nest on the Waves (2010) and The President of Planet Earth (2017), which was shortlisted for The Irish Times Poetry Now Award, and the critical study Contemporary British Poetry (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). He has edited the work of James Clarence Mangan for The Gallery Press, Samuel Beckett’s Selected Poems 1930–1989 for Faber and Faber, and The Wake Forest Series of Irish Poetry, Vol. IV (WFU Press, 2017). His writing has won various prizes, including the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, the Vincent Buckley Prize, and the Friends Provident (Irish) National Irish Poetry Competition. He lives in rural Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
Friday March 31, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Katzenberg Center, 3rd floor, CGS
 
Saturday, April 1
 

6:00pm EDT

A Student Poetry Reading
Saturday April 1, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT
Student-poets from Taunton High School and The Taunton Alternative High School read their work.
Saturday April 1, 2023 6:00pm - 7:30pm EDT
The District Center for the Arts

7:00pm EDT

The Thirsty Lab Reading Series: Jeffrey Levine
Saturday April 1, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The Thirsty Lab Reading Series on 206 Worcester Road in Princeton, MA 01541. The series began in 2013 and happens the fourth and fifth Tuesdays of every month from 7-9 p.m. There is no open. The reader has the full two hours to use as s/he wishes. Some read two sets of 30-45 minutes. Some bring musicians to play behind the words.  Some use part of the time for a workshop session and discussion. There is usually a bottle of wine to share, some home baked treats, great discussion and a poetically intelligent audience. A list of readers scheduled for 2020 follows:
 
2020
 
January 28                                                     Michael Milligan
February 25                                                  John Hodgen
March 24                                                       Jenith Charpentier
March 31                                                       Jeffrey Levine
April 28                                                          Patrick Donnelly
May 26                                                           Kathleen Fagley
June 23                                                          Sarah St. George
June 30                                                          Susan Roney-O’Brien
July 28                               Susan Boucher
August 25                                                      Richard Fox
September 22                                              Elizabeth McKim
September 29                                              Heather McPherson
October 27                                                     Bruce Galli
November 24                             David Surette
Speakers
Saturday April 1, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
206 Worcester Road 206 Worcester Road, Princeton, MA 01541

7:00pm EDT

CANCELED: The Poetorium at Starlite Reading Series & Open Mic Featuring Jonathan Andersen
Saturday April 1, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELED DUE TO THE ONGOING HEALTH CONCERNS!
However our previously announced feature Jonathan Andersen has been rescheduled for October 27th.

For more information, please contact us at poetorium@protonmail.com

Saturday April 1, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Starlite Bar & Gallery
 
Sunday, April 2
 

5:15pm EDT

POSTPONED - Harvard Divinity School Ingersoll Lecture with Anne Carson
Sunday April 2, 2023 5:15pm - 6:30pm EDT
We are delighted to invite you to this year's Harvard Divinity School Ingersoll Lecture on the Immortality of Man, “A Lecture on the History of Skywriting,” by poet, essayist, translator, and Professor of Classics Anne Carson.  Organized and sponsored jointly by the Center for the Study of World Religions and Harvard Divinity School as well as the Woodberry Poetry Room at Harvard University, this special event will take place on Wednesday, April 1, 2020, from 5:15 to 6:30 pm at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in the Norton’s Woods Conference Center (136 Irving Street, Cambridge).  Books will be sold at the event by The Coop.
 
Kindly note that seating is on a first-come, first-served basis.  
Speakers
Sunday April 2, 2023 5:15pm - 6:30pm EDT
Norton's Woods Conference Center

7:00pm EDT

Brandon Melendez & Courtney LeBlanc @ Porter Square Books
Sunday April 2, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Join Write Bloody poet Brandon Melendez and Vegetarian Alcoholic Press poet Courtney LeBlanc as they kick off National Poetry Month with a reading from their newest books featuring poems about love, loss, home, violence, grief, family, and hope.


Sunday April 2, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Wednesday, April 5
 

1:00pm EDT

Everything Begins Somewhere Book Launch & Reading
Wednesday April 5, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
Y'all: Amanda Lou Doster's chapbook, Everything Begins Somewhere, is FINALLY almost done for real this time! Come celebrate! 

Reading/Book-Selling/Book-Signing/Snack-Eating, exact schedule TBD later. 

The poetry isn't super kid-friendly, but Amanda's kiddo is coming & other kids are welcome & not expected to sit quietly listening to poetry. More details later!
Wednesday April 5, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
Federal Street Books
 
Saturday, April 8
 

6:00pm EDT

Poetry Reading by City of Worcester Poets Laureate Juan Matos and Amina Mohammed
Saturday April 8, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Newly named Poet Laureate Juan Matos and Youth Poet Laureate Amina Mohammed will join us to share their poetry through the lens of life in Worcester. Q & A to follow.
Juan Matos, a retired Worcester Public Schools teacher of 32 years, has written and published 12 poetry books and anthologies, taken part in local and international literary festivals, and founded several literary groups and workshops. Matos has a long record of actively advocating for poetry and the arts.
Youth Poet Laureate Amina Mohammed grew up in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood and has been writing since the eighth grade. She is currently a senior at Holy Name High School.
Saturday April 8, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Worcester Public Library Saxe Room
 
Sunday, April 9
 

11:00am EDT

3 Poets, 3 Languages: A World Poetry 2020 Event
Sunday April 9, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Readings by 3 poets, in 3 languages, featuring:
Marguerite Guzman Bouvard (Italian)
Marguerite was born in Trieste Italy. She is a former professor of Political Science and poetry workshops, and the author of 20 books in the fields of politics, women's rights, human rights, grief, illness, and spirituality. She has also written 8 books of poetry, her first won the Quarterly Review of Literature prize and her seventh "The Unpredictability of Light," won the MassBook Award for poetry. Her latest book was "The Invisible Wounds of War; Coming Home from Iraq and Afghanistan." She is a Resident Scholar at the Women Studies Research Center, Brandeis University.

Mirlande Butler (Haitian-Creole)
A native of Haiti, Mirlande Butler has performed a mix of Jazz, Pop and Gospel genres in the States, France, Brazil, and China. She links singing with the foundation she co-founded to promote education and a renewed Haiti. She often says that education, especially that of children, should be a human right matter, not a privilege. She holds a Ph.D. in Public Administration from Walden University and a Master's degree in Social Work from Boston University. The lyricist and guitarist John Elder says of her: 'Mirlande sings beautifully and with emotional power in four languages, French, Spanish, English and Haitian Creole. Her style is the human heart.'

Messou Youvina Fofana (French)
Born in the United States and raised in Guinea-Conakry, Messou is a Brockton High School student introduced to poetry writing from her English and poetry classes. Early on, she realized the impact of her voice and invested more into writing when she became aware of its range limit. She also realized that with her words she had a new way of expressing herself, more trustworthy than she sometimes could with her voice. Messou thus believed she could transcend time and better convey her emotions and thoughts to future generations. Her poems are often the results of her childhood memories and her sudden inspirations on themes of all kinds, ranging from love to her family, to her life as a sixteen-year-old, experiencing both African and American societies.
Sunday April 9, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Massasoit Community College

12:00pm EDT

3 Poets, 3 Languages: A World Poetry 2020 Event
Sunday April 9, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Readings by 3 poets, in 3 languages, featuring:

Ines Figueroa (Spanish)
Ines came to the United States in 1956 from Puerto Rico where she settled with her family in Newark New Jersey. In the early sixties, she married and had four daughters unfortunately during that period in her life she suffered from spousal abuse. At that, time there was nowhere to escape her surroundings and she suffered in silence. She finally summoned the courage to leave her husband and in 1984 found her way to Brockton with her daughters. Since then Ines has dedicated all her time educating the community about domestic violence and sexual assault. Ines graduated from Massasoit College in Human Service and from Boston University for Social Work. Ines has received numerous awards and in 1997, was named woman of the year for her contribution to the Hispanic Community.

Philip Hasouris (Greek)
A proud Brockton Poet and author of three books of poetry, Philip is the poetry coordinator and host of the Brockton Library Poetry Series, “Everyone Has a Voice.” He is also the poetry coordinator for the art/poetry exhibit "Soar without Limits, Healing through the Arts," bringing together, artists with disabilities and poets who, inspired by their artwork, create poetry, validating the artist. He is a facilitator of expressive healing workshops throughout the state for support groups coping with medical crisis and bereavement.
Zvi A. Sesling (Yiddish)
Poet Laureate of Brookline, MA. Zvi has published poetry in numerous magazines both in print and online in many countries. He has been nominated four times for a Pushcart Prize and was awarded First Prize in the Reuben Rose International Poetry Competition. He was the 2019 Feature Reader at the 10th Brookline Jewish Poetry Festival. His poetry book The Lynching of Leo Frank was nominated for the National Jewish Book Award. He is also the author of War Zones, Fire Tongue, King of the Jungle and three chapbooks, Simple Game, Poems From Hell and Across Stones of Bad Dream. Zvi has taught at Boston University , Emerson College and Suffolk University.
Speakers
Sunday April 9, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Massasoit Community College

6:00pm EDT

Cathy Park Hong
Sunday April 9, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Speakers
Sunday April 9, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Forum Room, Lamont Library 11 Quincy Street, Cambridge MA
 
Monday, April 10
 

6:00pm EDT

CANCELLED - Joy Harjo
Monday April 10, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Speakers
Monday April 10, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Menschell Hall Harvard Art Museums Quincy Street Cambridge

6:30pm EDT

Nick Flynn--Stay
Monday April 10, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join artist Daniel Heyman for a conversation with Nick Flynn about collaboration. With his new book Stay, acclaimed poet, artist, and bestselling memoirist Nick Flynn presents a self-portrait via a constellation of topics that have circled his work. Ranging from the impact of suicide and homelessness to addiction, political engagement, and the vital power of artistic friendships, Stay is a mixed-media retrospective that shows nothing is created in isolation. Mirroring Flynn’s life, this work of visual and literary memoir is populated by examples of his collaborations since the 1980s with such luminaries as the photographers Amy Arbus and Catherine Opie, composer Guy Barash, actor Robert De Niro, cartoonist Josh Neufeld, author Sarah Sentilles, filmmaker Paul Weitz, and artists John Baldessari, Marilyn Minter, and Bill Shuck. In Flynn’s refusal to conform to narrative or the safety of his own perspective, Stay grasps for an essential truth, an answer to what art, in the end, can and cannot reflect.

The event will also feature performances by tK (Thalia Zedek, Heather Kapplow, and Phil Milstein), as well as a reading by City of Boston Youth Poet Laureate Alondra Bobadilla.
Monday April 10, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
Boston Public Library's Main Branch
 
Wednesday, April 12
 

7:00pm EDT

LGBTQ+ Lowell Open Mic
Wednesday April 12, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Come on down to the cafe for a night celebrating local LGBTQ+ talent. Whether you're an amateur or a seasoned professional we want to hear your songs, stories, and poems, see your dance routines, and laugh til our sides hurt at your stand up bits. Emcee Resi Ibañez is a Filipinx genderqueer poet, writer, and community storyteller, who believes in storytelling as a way of building community. They have been published in bklyn boihood’s Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity, LOAM magazine, and will soon be published in Blue Oak Press’s upcoming anthology They Rise Like a Wave: an Anthology of Asian American Woman Poets, as well as Loom Press’s Atlantic Currents: Connecting Cork and Lowell. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/1770488649764214/ .
Exhibitors
Wednesday April 12, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852

7:00pm EDT

Poetic Recovery
Wednesday April 12, 2023 7:00pm - 11:00pm EDT
Are you a socially conscious hip-hop artist or poet who is looking to inspire, be inspired and collaborate with other like-minded individuals like yourself? Join us for this monthly Poetic Recovery workshop every 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month to share our own work within a supportive community. We will discuss artistic consciousness, different aspects of the cultural work, and the possibilities that potentially await you.
Bring something to write with, something to write on and you.
Suggested donation is $10.00.
--
The workshop host, Maurice Taylor, is an East Coast director of hip-hop congress and has been organizing open mics, poetry slams and hip-hop workshops for over 20 years. Maurice “Soulfighter” Taylor set out in 2006 to create Poetic Recovery as a platform to give voice to artists in recovery. It is a collection of cultural and educational activities that facilitate the nurturing of artists towards higher consciousness. These activities allow artists to reflect and perform for audiences from communities effected by traumatic experiences. These shared energies will help facilitate a cultural healing process between artists and community to recover of our cultural identity appropriated and exploited by the music industry that has resulted in cultural genocide.
Speakers
Wednesday April 12, 2023 7:00pm - 11:00pm EDT
Make-It Springfield 168 Worthington Street Springfield, MA 01103
 
Thursday, April 13
 

7:00pm EDT

The Power of Poetry
Thursday April 13, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
April is National Poetry Month and what better way to celebrate than with a panel discussion with Porsha OlayiwolaDanielle Legros GeorgesChen Chen, and Dara Wier, moderated by the host of PBS' "Poetry in America," Elisa New. They will discuss diversity in contemporary poetry and how poets use their art form to respond to the world around them.

Join WGBH and Mass Poetry, on April 12th, 2021, at 7 PM EDT for this live, interactive conversation with our panel of local poets. A general admission ticket ($25) includes access to the Zoom webinar discussion and a special digital collection of curated poems from the panel. If poetry is your passion and you want to support WGBH, please consider the Poetry Bundle ticket ($100) that also includes the printed collections of each poet featured at the event.
Speakers
Thursday April 13, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online
 
Saturday, April 15
 

7:30pm EDT

Natasha Trethewey and Megan Fernandes : Robert Lowell Memorial Lecture Series
Saturday April 15, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Reception to follow at BU Castle
Saturday April 15, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Leventhal Center Auditorium 233 Bay State Rd.
 
Sunday, April 16
 

7:00pm EDT

Lynne Viti, Reading
Sunday April 16, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Author of two poetry chapbooks and a forthcoming full-length poetry collection and a short fiction collection, Lynne Viti will read from her newest works, both poetry and flash fiction. Q & A and book signing to follow.
BIO:Lynne Viti, lecturer emerita in the Writing Program, Wellesley College, is the author of two poetry chapbooks, Baltimore Girls (2017), and The Glamorganshire Bible (2018), and three micro-chapbooks: Punting, (2017), Dreaming Must be Done in the Daytime (2018), and In Louisburgh, County Mayo, Thinking of Dublin (2019), from Origami Poems Project. She received Honorable Mentions in the Glimmer Train Short Fiction Contest, the WOMR/Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Contest, the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Contest, and Grey Borders Wanted Works. Her first full-length poetry collection, Dancing at Lake Montebello, will be published in November 2020 by Apprentice House Press. Her debut hort story collection, Going Too Fast, will be published in March 2020 by Finishing Line Press. She blogs at stillinschool.wordpress.com.
Sunday April 16, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Westwood Public Library, Islington Branch 288 Washington Street., Westwood MA 02090

8:00pm EDT

Visiting Writers Series: Mary Ruefle
Sunday April 16, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Mary Ruefle is the author of many books, including Dunce (Wave Books, 2019), My Private Property (Wave Books, 2016), Trances of the Blast (Wave Books, 2013), Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures (Wave Books, 2012), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism, and Selected Poems (Wave Books, 2010), winner of the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America. She has also published a comic book, Go Home and Go to Bed! (Pilot Books/Orange Table Comics, 2007), and is an erasure artist, whose treatments of nineteenth century texts have been exhibited in museums and galleries and published in A Little White Shadow (Wave Books, 2006). Ruefle is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Robert Creeley Award, an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, and a Whiting Award. Her most recent book, Dunce (Wave Books, 2019), was long listed for the National Book Award in poetry. She lives in Bennington, Vermont.
Speakers
Sunday April 16, 2023 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Bernie Dallas Room, UMass Amherst Bernie Dallas Room, Goodell Hall, 140 Hicks Way, University of Massachusetts
 
Monday, April 17
 

7:00pm EDT

National Poetry Month with Martha Collins and Jason Tandon
Monday April 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Martha Collins is the author of Night Unto Night (Milkweed, 2018), Admit One: An American Scrapbook (Pittsburgh, 2016), Day Unto Day (Milkweed, 2014), White Papers (Pitt Poetry Series, 2012), and Blue Front (Graywolf, 2006), a book-length poem based on a lynching her father witnessed when he was five years old. Collins has also published four earlier collections of poems, three books of co-translations from the Vietnamese, and two chapbooks.


Jason Tandon is the author of four books of poetry including THE ACTUAL WORLD (Black Lawrence Press, 2019), QUALITY OF LIFE (Black Lawrence Press, 2013), GIVE OVER THE HECKLER AND EVERYONE GETS HURT (Black Lawrence Press, 2009), winner of the St. Lawrence Book Award, and WEE HOUR MARTYRDOM (sunnyoutside, 2008). His poems have appeared in many journals and magazines, including Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, Beloit Poetry Journal, AGNI Online, Barrow Street, and Esquire. Since 2008, he has taught in the Arts & Sciences Writing Program at Boston University.
Speakers
Monday April 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Wellesley Books

7:00pm EDT

Queer + Trans Poetry and Prose Reading and Open Mic
Monday April 17, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Read and listen to queer and trans writing - your own or others! Come early to sign up for the open mic and bring a friend.
Hosted by creative writing faculty Samuel Ace and Andrea Lawlor. Co-sponsored by the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum and the MHC Department of English.
Monday April 17, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Art Building, Hinchcliff Reception Hall (Mt. Holyoke) Lower Lake Rd, South Hadley, MA 01075
 
Wednesday, April 19
 

10:00am EDT

Community Poetry Experience!
Wednesday April 19, 2023 10:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Calling All Poets … and everyone interested in poetry and the spoken word … EXPRESS YOURSELF!

Welcome to the Westfield Community Poetry Experience! This is the final event in the series of monthly open mic poetry events and experiences culminating in a celebration of National Poetry Month.

We celebrate National Poetry Month at this event with light refreshments, open mic poetry readings and recognition of some of the poetry written and read during the Community Poetry Experience series run from January through April.

This event is FREE and open to all, marking the series finale!

Write, read or just stop by and listen! Watch for writing prompts for each session on Facebook, inspired and motivated by art work by local and regional artists to stimulate written works and discussion. 

Write. Read. Share. Listen. You’re invited … 

Wednesday April 19, 2023 10:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Blue Umbrella Books

4:00pm EDT

The Liminal Reading Series
Wednesday April 19, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Wednesday April 19, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
MIT Press Bookstore
 
Sunday, April 23
 

7:00pm EDT

Omar Sakr, George Abraham, Chen Chen, and moira j
Sunday April 23, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
n The Lost Arabs, Award-winning Arab Australian poet Omar Sakr presents a pulsating collection of poetry that interrogates the bonds and borders of family, faith, queerness, and nationality.

George Abraham’s highly anticipated debut Birthright constructs a dialogue in which “every pronoun is a Free Palestine.” Through poems of immense emotion, and the use of alluring form, Abraham crafts work that examines what we come to own by existing.

Chen Chen’s award-winning debut, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities, interrogates the fragile, inherited ways of approaching love and family from Asian American, immigrant, and queer perspectives.

Bury Me in Thunder, the full-length debut by moira j., is an eviscerating collection, suffused with nature, ceremony, and pain. Delivering an unflinching look into the consumption of Indigenous people, this collection sheds new light on the colonization of North America and how trauma is carried through intergenerational memory.

Omar Sakr is a bisexual Muslim poet born and raised in Western Sydney to Lebanese and Turkish migrants. His debut collection These Wild Houses (2017) was shortlisted for the Judith Wright Calanthe Award and the Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry. Omar’s poems have been published in English, Arabic, and Spanish, featuring or forthcoming in the American Academy of Poets Poem-A-Day series, Prairie Schooner, The Margins, Tinderbox, Wildness, Peril, Circulo de Poesía, Overland, Meanjin, and Antic, among others. Anthologized in Best Australian Poems 2016 and in Contemporary Australian Poetry, he is the 2019 recipient of the Edward Stanley Award for Poetry.

George Abraham is a Palestinian American poet from Jacksonville, Florida. They are the author of Birthright (Button Poetry, 2020), and the chapbooks: the specimen’s apology (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2019) and al youm (TAR, 2017). He is a Kundiman and Watering Hole fellow, and recipient of the College Union Poetry Slam International’s Best Poet title. Their work has been published with the Paris Review, American Poetry Review, LitHub, Poem-A-Day, and Bettering American Poetry. He is currently based in Massachusetts, where he is a PhD candidate in Bioengineering at Harvard University.

Chen Chen was born in Xiamen, China, and grew up in Massachusetts. His work has appeared in two chapbooks and in such publications as Poetry, Gulf Coast, Indiana Review, Best of the Net, and The Best American Poetry. The recipient of the 2016 A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize, he has been awarded fellowships from Kundiman, the Saltonstall Foundation, Lambda Literary, and in 2015, he was a finalist for the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowships. He earned his BA at Hampshire College and his MFA at Syracuse University. Currently, he is pursuing a PhD in English and Creative Writing at Texas Tech University. Chen lives in Lubbock, Texas, with his partner, Jeff Gilbert, and their pug dog, Rupert Giles.

moira j. is an agender writer of Dził Łigai Si’an N’dee descent. They are the winner of the 2018 Pacific Spirit Poetry Prize and are Frontier Poetry’s 2019 Frontier New Voices Fellow. moira j.’s writing examines narratives of indigeneity, queerness, gender, sex, kinship, and illness. Their work has been featured with many publications, including The Shallow Ends, WILDNESS, and PRISM International. They currently live with their partner in the occupied Massachusett homelands of Nutohkemminnit (Greater Boston, Massachusetts).

https://www.brooklinebooksmith.com/events/2020-04/omar-sakr-george-abraham-ad-chen-chen/
Sunday April 23, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Brookline Booksmith
 
Monday, April 24
 

7:00pm EDT

Memorial Reading for Jane Kenyon
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Microphone
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Free event. After featured readers, a break for refreshments followed by open mic. On-street parking and in unnumbered spaces, as well as at rear of building,.
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Roslindale House

7:00pm EDT

Lynne Viti Heather Corbally Bryant/Tavi Gonzalez/Pamela Taylor celebrate the Bard's Birthday with Poetry
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Four poets read from their new works, in celebration of William Shakespeare's 456th birthday.

Lynne Viti, is the author of Baltimore Girls (2017),and The Glamorganshire Bible (2018), and three micro-chapbooks: Punting, (2017), Dreaming Must be Done in the Daytime (2018), and In Louisburgh, County Mayo, Thinking of Dublin (2019. Her debut short story collection is entitled Going Too Fast, (2020) and her full-length poetry collection, Dancing at Lake Montebello, is forthcoming in November 2020.

Heather Corbally Bryant is the author of nine poetry collections. The most recent are
Leaving Santorini (2019, and Practicing Yoga in a Former Shoe Factory (2020)

Octavio (Tavi) Gonzalez is the author of The Book of Ours (2009), from University of Notre Dame, Momotombo Press and poems in the anthology Retrato íntimo de poetas dominicanos: Antología poética de la diáspora

Pamela Taylor, a Cave Canem Fellow (2012-2014). 's chapbook is entitled My Mother’s Child,(Hyacinth Girl Press, June 2015). Her blog, www.poetsdoublelife.com, is geared toward poets with non-literary careers.
Monday April 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Wellesley Books
 
Tuesday, April 25
 

6:30pm EDT

Beals Prize for Poetry
Tuesday April 25, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
Ten Finalists will read their work. The top three will receive prize money of $100 for first, $50 for second and $25 for third.

THE BEALS PRIZE FOR POETRY
CALL FOR ENTRIES
Submission deadline: March 31, 2020
Go to bealslibrary.org for more information
Tuesday April 25, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
Beals Memorial Library
 
Wednesday, April 26
 

6:00pm EDT

Christine Casson and Rita Ciresi
Wednesday April 26, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Speakers
Wednesday April 26, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
I Am Books
 
Saturday, April 29
 

7:00pm EDT

The Thirsty Lab Reading Series: Patrick Donnelly
Saturday April 29, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
The Thirsty Lab Reading Series on 206 Worcester Road in Princeton, MA 01541. The series began in 2013 and happens the fourth and fifth Tuesdays of every month from 7-9 p.m. There is no open. The reader has the full two hours to use as s/he wishes. Some read two sets of 30-45 minutes. Some bring musicians to play behind the words.  Some use part of the time for a workshop session and discussion. There is usually a bottle of wine to share, some home baked treats, great discussion and a poetically intelligent audience. A list of readers scheduled for 2020 follows:

2020

January 28 Michael Milligan
February 25 John Hodgen
March 24 Jenith Charpentier
March 31 Jeffrey Levine
April 28 Patrick Donnelly
May 26 Kathleen Fagley
June 23 Sarah St. George
June 30 Susan Roney-O’Brien
July 28 Susan Boucher
August 25 Richard Fox
September 22 Elizabeth McKim
September 29 Heather McPherson
October 27 Bruce Galli
November 24 David Surette

Speakers
Saturday April 29, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
206 Worcester Road 206 Worcester Road, Princeton, MA 01541

7:00pm EDT

CANCELED: The Poetorium at Starlite Reading Series & Open Mic Featuring Eileen Cleary
Saturday April 29, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELED DUE TO THE ONGOING PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERNS!
However, our previously announced feature Eileen Cleary for this night has been rescheduled to read at the Poetorium at Starlite on November 24th. Hope to see you then!

Please join us on April 28th for our monthly open mic and featured poetry reading series The Poetorium at Starlite hosted by Paul Szlosek and Ron Whittle. It will be a full evening of poetry and spoken word starting with a brief interview on stage with our featured poet Eileen Cleary (Author of Child Ward of the Commonwealth), followed by a poetry reading by our feature, a 10-minute tribute to a dead poet by a guest reader, a short intermission, and then the open mic (with 5-minute slots for each reader). Admission is free (but a hat will be passed to pay our features)

For more information, please email us at poetorium@protonmail.com
Moderators
Saturday April 29, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Starlite Bar & Gallery
 
Sunday, April 30
 

6:00pm EDT

The T.S. Eliot Memorial Reading: Claudia Rankine
Sunday April 30, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Speakers
Sunday April 30, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Knafel Auditorium, Radcliffe Institute 10 Garden Street, Cambridge MA
 
Monday, May 1
 

6:00pm EDT

HERE ALL NIGHT: POETRY & COCKTAILS
Monday May 1, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Registration is requested

Members $20 and Non-members $30
Here All Night: Poetry & Cocktailswith Jill McDonough

Join acclaimed poet Jill McDonough for a night of poetry and themed cocktails. Her latest collection is a fiercely unapologetic, transforming mundane moments into witty and provocative insights that closely examine the flaws in our quick-moving society. Using dark humor, the poems address the impermanence of life and how we should always find reasons to re-evaluate ourselves as empathetic beings over our selfish tendencies.
Jill McDonough is the author of Habeas Corpus (Salt, 2008), Oh, James! (Seven Kitchens, 2012), Where You Live (Salt, 2012), Reaper (Alice James, 2017), and Here All Night (Alice James, 2019). The recipient of three Pushcart prizes and fellowships from the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Fine Arts Work Center, the New York Public Library, the Library of Congress, and Stanford’s Stegner program, she taught incarcerated college students through Boston University’s Prison Education Program for thirteen years.  Her work has appeared in Poetry, Slate, The Nation, The Threepenny Review, and Best American Poetry.  She teaches in the MFA program at UMass-Boston and offers College Reading and Writing at a Boston jail. Her website is jillmcdonough.com.
Monday May 1, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Boston Athenæum 10½ Beacon Street, Boston, MA
 
Wednesday, May 10
 

1:00pm EDT

Florence Poetry Carnival
Wednesday May 10, 2023 1:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
The Florence Poetry Carnival is a community art event that takes place in the middle of town. This is the second year the carnival is part of ArtWeekMass. This public art project presents poetry as an inclusive and accessible expressive art through playful interactivity and by programming poetry as a multi and interdisciplinary art form. In the afternoon, strolling performers, poetry on demand and custom poetry carnival games are part of lawn activities. The day will close with a shared reading by local poets laureate: Springfield's Magdalena Gomez, Hadley's Wanda Cook and Maria Jose Gimenez, Easthampton's 2019 poet laureate. Please come join us! Stay up to date : https://www.facebook.com/florencepoetrycarnival

Wednesday May 10, 2023 1:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
90 Park Street, Florence, Massachusetts

7:00pm EDT

LGBTQ+ Lowell Open Mic
Wednesday May 10, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Come on down to the cafe for a night celebrating local LGBTQ+ talent. Whether you're an amateur or a seasoned professional we want to hear your songs, stories, and poems, see your dance routines, and laugh til our sides hurt at your stand up bits. Emcee Resi Ibañez is a Filipinx genderqueer poet, writer, and community storyteller, who believes in storytelling as a way of building community. They have been published in bklyn boihood’s Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity, LOAM magazine, and will soon be published in Blue Oak Press’s upcoming anthology They Rise Like a Wave: an Anthology of Asian American Woman Poets, as well as Loom Press’s Atlantic Currents: Connecting Cork and Lowell. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/1770488649764214/ .


Exhibitors
Wednesday May 10, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852
 
Thursday, May 18
 

3:00pm EDT

Arrowsmith Press: Spring 2020 Book Launch
Thursday May 18, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Our writers will be reading from Arrowsmith's Spring 2020 publications:


Peter Balakian is the author of 8 books of poems, 4 books of prose, 3 collaborative translations and several edited books. “No Sign,” is the title poem of Balakian’s forthcoming book of poems. Ozone Journal won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for poetry, Black Dog of Fate, a memoir won the 1998 PEN/Martha Albrand Prize for the Art of the Memoir; The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response won the 2005 Raphael Lemkin Prize. His collaborative translations include two books by Grigoris Balakian: Armenian Golgotha: A Memoir of the Armenian Genocide and The Ruins of Ani. Among his other books of prose is Vice and Shadow: Essays on the Lyric Imagination, Poetry, Art, and Culture. His work has been translated into more than a dozen languages. Balakian is the recipient of many awards and prizes and civic citations including the Presidential Medal from the Republic of Armenia, Guggenheim and NEA Fellowships, The Spendlove Prize for Social Justice, Tolerance, and Diplomacy, and The Emily Clark Balch Prize for poetry from the Virginia Quarterly Review. He is Donald M. and Constance H. Rebar Professor of the Humanities in the department of English and Director of Creative Writing at Colgate University.

Scott Harney (1955-2019) was a practicing poet who, aside from a few early publications in the Somerville Community News, did not publish during his lifetime, leaving a significant body of work to be discovered by readers after his death. He grew up in and around Boston, graduating from Charlestown High School and Harvard College. His literary influences include Robert Lowell and Jane Shore, with whom he studied at Harvard in the 1970s, as well as Richard Hugo and Philip Levine.

Megan Marshall is the winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize in Biography for Margaret Fuller. She is also the author of The Peabody Sisters, which won the Francis Parkman Prize, the Mark Lynton History Prize and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2006, and 2017's Elizabeth Bishop: A Miracle for Breakfast. She is the Charles Wesley Emerson College Professor and teaches narrative nonfiction and the art of archival research in the MFA program at Emerson College.

Kythe Heller is a poet, essayist, multimedia artist, and scholar who received an MDiv at Harvard Divinity School and is currently completing a doctorate at Harvard University in Comparative Religion and Arts and Media Practice. She is also a practitioner of Sufism and a student of M.R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen. Her published work includes two poetry chapbooks, Immolation (Monk Honey) and Thunder (Wick: Harvard Divinity School), the philosophical monograph “An Ethnography of Spirituality” (Cambridge UP), an essay in the anthology Quo Anima: spirituality and innovation in contemporary women’s poetry (Akron Series in Contemporary Poetics), and poems and essays published in American Poetry Review, Tricycle, The Southern Review, and elsewhere. Her work has been supported by grants and fellowships from Harvard University, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, The Mellon Foundation, The MacDowell Colony, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, and Squaw Valley Community of Writers. While completing an MFA at Sarah Lawrence College, she created a literacy and creative arts program at the Coachman Family Homeless Shelter in White Plains, New York; she has also worked and taught through the Bard Prison Initiative, Janus Youth Shelters, Bradley-Angle Women’s Shelter, and Yellow Brick Road Street Outreach; currently she is a teaching fellow at Harvard University and on the faculty of the Language and Thinking Program at Bard College. In 2017, she founded VISION LAB, a collective of creatives working across spirituality, the arts, social and environmental justice, and technology.

Winner of Arrowsmith's Ramaswamy Prize, Oksana Zabuzhko is one of Ukraine’s best known and most important public intellectuals. Her controversial novel, Field Work in Ukrainian Sex, is widely regarded as a contemporary classic and has been translated into more than a dozen languages. Her most recent novel, Museum of Abandoned Secrets, explores the untold stories of Soviet life in the second half of the twentieth century. Zabuzhko has been a Fulbright scholar, and has taught Ukrainian literature at Penn State, Pittsburgh University, and Harvard. Her book Notre-dame d’Ukraine is a cultural study focused on the work of the fin-de-siecle writer Lesia Ukrainka. Founding editor of Komora Publishers, she works at the Hryhori Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy at the National Academy of Sciences in Ukraine.
Thursday May 18, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
First Parish Church

3:30pm EDT

Janet MacFadyen with photographer Stephen Schmidt: Poetry Reading & Slideshow
Thursday May 18, 2023 3:30pm - 5:00pm EDT
Local poet Janet MacFayden will be reading from her book of poetry, and her husband Stephen Schmidt will be showing slides of the American Southwest.
We will meet in the upstairs reading room.
The Arms is accessible via the lower level entrance.
Speakers
Thursday May 18, 2023 3:30pm - 5:00pm EDT
Arms Library
 
Saturday, May 20
 

6:00pm EDT

U35
Saturday May 20, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Saturday May 20, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Trident Booksellers & Cafe
 
Monday, May 29
 

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Monday May 29, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Zoom reading with open microphone

For Zoom link, Zoom contact hguran@aol.com
Monday May 29, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Zoom
 
Thursday, June 1
 

11:00am EDT

Poetry Writing 101 with Susan Roney-O’Brien: In Form, Conform, Reform
Thursday June 1, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Traditional or “received” forms give poets the opportunity to practice technique, to work within an established scaffolding. We tune our ears to meter and rhythmic patterns that, once set up, are expected. So many forms to explore! We’ll start simply, define and try, limericks, acrostics, abcderians, haikus, tankas and move on to read sonnets, sestinas and villanelles. Perhaps once we know the pattern, we can learn to break the form like Robert Frost did in “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening”.
Thursday June 1, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, June 7
 

11:00am EDT

Northfield Authors & Artists Festival
Wednesday June 7, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Designed to be an annual event, Authors and Artists, had been planned as a destination festival
for Northfield, MA on June 13. When the pandemic struck, we adapted and moved online. The
festival is still free, and open to all, but now accessible to a wider audience. Spreading the
festival out over all 4 Saturdays in June, from 11am to 2pm avoids concurrent programming, and
allows people to register for one or more weeks. The festival will still include opportunities for
local authors and artists to participate with an online art show, nature poetry coordinated with
Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust, and readings each week.

Headline speakers include the Vermont mystery writer Archer Mayor; National Poet Beat
Laureate Paul Richmond; writer of African-American history Dr. Gretchen Holbrook-Gerzina;
women's rights activist and memoire author Dr. Lise Weil; peace activist-poet JuPong Lin; art
educator Dr. Simone Alter-Muri; and Abenaki author Cheryl Savageau. Children's programming
includes authors Deanna Cook (kids cooking) and Christina Uss (bikes, books, and persistence).
For a full schedule of events including ways to join in see our website:
authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com

Registration is open on the website or using this link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DUj_BdkcTmGZld6mBHWfOQ

Funded in part by Massachusetts Local Cultural Council money from Northfield, Gill,
Bernardston, and Warwick; Greenfield-Northampton Cooperative Bank; Kiwanis Club of
Northfield, MA; Greenfield Savings Bank; Deerfield Valley Art Association; Dickinson
Memorial Library; and the Northfield Historical Commission.
Press contact: Lisa McLoughlin 413-475-0650; Lisa@hemlockhouse.net
Wednesday June 7, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Zoom
 
Saturday, June 10
 

6:00pm EDT

Lit Crawl: Mass Poetry Presents Poems To Go featuring the Traveling Poetry Emporium
Saturday June 10, 2023 6:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Get your quick poetry fix! Mass Poetry presents the Traveling Poetry Emporium: poets Cassandra de Alba and Julia Story will offer poems-to-order on your subject, composed right before your eyes. Visitors to this booth can name any topic—large or small, real or imagined, object-specific or broadly thematic. One of the Emporium's poets will compose an original poem on your topic within five minutes, typed on a manual Hermes typewriter. The poet will read the poem aloud before handing you the only existing copy of the poem, which is yours to keep. Come with five minutes and leave with a one-of-a-kind made-to-order poem!

About LitCrawl
Lit Crawl features more than a dozen separate readings, performances, and interactive
games—all held outdoors in some of Cambridge’s hippest restaurant patios and performance
venues. This year’s event will have all of the quirky and unexpected fun that Lit Crawl attendees
have come to expect, but in order to manage capacities at our host venues, we need to institute
some new policies this year. These include requiring registration (free through Eventbrite for
events at Starlight Square, $15 for events at restaurants) for all events unless otherwise noted--
attendees must register separately for each session. The full schedule and registration link can be found here: https://bostonbookfest.org/year-round-events/lit-crawl-boston/

The Traveling Poetry Emporium Poets
Cassandra de Alba is a poet living in Massachusetts. Her chapbooks are habitats (Horse Less Press, 2016), Ugly/Sad (Glass Poetry Press, 2020) and Cryptids (Ginger Bug Press, 2020). Her work has appeared in The Shallow Ends, Big Lucks, and Wax Nine, among other publications. She is a poetry reader for Underblong and an instructor at the Redbud Writing Project.

Julia Story is the author of Post Moxie (Sarabande Books) and the chapbooks The Trapdoor (dancing girl press) and Julie the Astonishing (Sixth Finch Books). She is a 2016 recipient of a Pushcart Prize and her recent work can be read in Sixth Finch, Tinderbox, and Tupelo Quarterly. She is a Midwesterner who now lives in Massachusetts.

Saturday June 10, 2023 6:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Starlight Square

7:00pm EDT

Daniel Johnson & Anthony Febo
Saturday June 10, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Anthony Febo is a Puerto Rican poet, artist, and new dad living in Malden, MA. Febo has been performing and teaching poetry and theatre for over a decade in the greater Boston area. He was featured as part of WBUR’s The ARTery 25 as an artist to watch. In the classroom, Febo treats each workshop as it’s own celebration. He draws on his experiences from his time in theatre spaces, museums, non-profits, and art centers. On the stage, he has toured the country individually and as half of Adobo-Fish-Sauce: a cooking and poetry collaboration. His work examines what it means to actively choose joy in the face of what is trying to break you. Weaving performance into his writing, he examines issues such as toxic masculinity, family, culture, identity, and the role representation plays into a person’s development. His first full length book of poetry, Becoming an Island, can be purchased at Game Over Books. Visit him online at https://www.thisisfebo.com and https://adobofishsauce.com.

Daniel Johnson is the author of How to Catch a Falling Knife, published by Alice James Books. In 2018, he was commissioned to compose lines of poetry for the twin memorials honoring those killed and wounded in the Boston Marathon bombings. His writing has appeared in Tin House, The Iowa Review, The Best American Poetry, Boston Review, jubilat, and elsewhere. He recently completed his second volume of poems, Shadow Act, an Elegy for American Journalist James Foley. He currently serves as the executive director of Mass Poetry.

Registration link:
https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcqcOmqqD8qH9TCLl0s1RWEaXIjjlFt27wC


Facebook event:
https://www.facebook.com/events/752107948763238

Saturday June 10, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Menino Arts Center
 
Sunday, June 11
 

4:00pm EDT

All Morning the Crows: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Meg Kearney
Sunday June 11, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Bird lovers everywhere will be drawn to Meg Kearney's latest poetry collection, inspired by (but not always necessarily about) our feathered friends. All Morning the Crows, winner of the Washington Prize, arrived hot off the presses on June 1. Meg is also author of The Ice Storm, a heroic crown of sonnets published as a chapbook in 2020 (now in its third printing!); Home By Now, winner of the 2010 PEN New England LL Winship Award and finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize and Foreword Magazine's Book of the Year, and An Unkindness of Ravens. Meg also writes for young people, including three novels in verse for teens and a picture book, Trouper, winner of the 2015 Kentucky Bluegrass Award. Meg's poetry has been featured on Poetry Daily, Ted Kooser's "American Life in Poetry" column, and Garrison Keillor's "A Writer's Almanac," and has been published in myriad anthologies. A four-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize, Meg is founding director of the Solstice MFA in Creative Writing Program in Massachusetts.
Speakers
Sunday June 11, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, June 14
 

11:00am EDT

Northfield Authors & Artists Festival
Wednesday June 14, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Designed to be an annual event, Authors and Artists, had been planned as a destination festival
for Northfield, MA on June 13. When the pandemic struck, we adapted and moved online. The
festival is still free, and open to all, but now accessible to a wider audience. Spreading the
festival out over all 4 Saturdays in June, from 11am to 2pm avoids concurrent programming, and
allows people to register for one or more weeks. The festival will still include opportunities for
local authors and artists to participate with an online art show, nature poetry coordinated with
Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust, and readings each week.

Headline speakers include the Vermont mystery writer Archer Mayor; National Poet Beat
Laureate Paul Richmond; writer of African-American history Dr. Gretchen Holbrook-Gerzina;
women's rights activist and memoire author Dr. Lise Weil; peace activist-poet JuPong Lin; art
educator Dr. Simone Alter-Muri; and Abenaki author Cheryl Savageau. Children's programming
includes authors Deanna Cook (kids cooking) and Christina Uss (bikes, books, and persistence).

For a full schedule of events including ways to join in see our website:
authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com
Registration is open on the website or using this link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DUj_BdkcTmGZld6mBHWfOQ

Funded in part by Massachusetts Local Cultural Council money from Northfield, Gill,
Bernardston, and Warwick; Greenfield-Northampton Cooperative Bank; Kiwanis Club of
Northfield, MA; Greenfield Savings Bank; Deerfield Valley Art Association; Dickinson
Memorial Library; and the Northfield Historical Commission.
Press contact: Lisa McLoughlin 413-475-0650; Lisa@hemlockhouse.net
Wednesday June 14, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Zoom

7:00pm EDT

Grubbie Debut: Dariel Suarez with Jonathan Escoffery, The Playwright's House
Wednesday June 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join Porter Square Books and GrubStreet to celebrate the launch of The Playwright's House, the debut novel from Dariel Suarez, GrubStreet's Education Director! Dariel will be joined in conversation by Jonathan Escoffery. This event is free and open to all, hosted on Crowdcast in partnership with Grubstreet.

“The Playwright's House is a bighearted novel, intricately embedded in the politics and daily life of contemporary Cuba. It is also a family story of love, sibling rivalry, courage, and redemption. Suarez writes with energy, exuberance, and psychological acuity. The straightforward prose adds gravity and earnestness to this remarkable novel.”
—Ha Jin, National Book Award winner and author of War Trash 

Happily married, backed by a powerful mentor, and with career prospects that would take him abroad, Serguey has more than any young Cuban lawyer could ask for. But when his estranged brother Victor appears with news that their father—famed theater director Felipe Blanco—has been detained for what he suspects are political reasons, Serguey’s privileged life is suddenly shaken.

A return to his childhood home in Havana’s decaying suburbs—a place filled with art, politics, and the remnants of a dissolving family—reconnects Serguey with his troubled past. He learns of an elusive dramaturge’s link to Felipe, a man who could be key to his father’s release. With the help of a social media activist and his wife’s ties with the Catholic Church, Serguey sets out to unlock the mystery of Felipe’s arrest and, in the process, is forced to confront the reasons for the hostility between him and Victor: two violent childhood episodes that scarred them in unforgettable ways. On the verge of imprisonment, Serguey realizes he must make a decision regarding not just his father, but his family and his own future, a decision which, under the harsh shadow of a communist state, he cannot afford to regret.

Dariel Suarez was born and raised in Havana, Cuba. In 1997, at age fourteen, he immigrated to the United States with his family during the island’s economic crisis known as The Special Period. Dariel is now the author of the novel The Playwright’s House and the story collection A Kind of Solitude, winner of the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction and the International Latino Book Award for Best Collection of Short Stories. He is an inaugural City of Boston Artist Fellow and the Education Director at GrubStreet. His work has been awarded the First Lady Cecile de Jongh Literary Prize and will be anthologized in this year’s Best American Essays. He has also been published in The Threepenny Review, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Michigan Quarterly Review, and The Caribbean Writer, among others. Dariel earned his MFA in Fiction at Boston University and currently resides in the Boston area with his wife and daughter.

Jonathan Escoffery is the author of the linked story collection, If I Survive You, forthcoming fall 2022 from FSG, as well as the forthcoming novel, Play Stone Kill Bird. He is the recipient of the 2020 Plimpton Prize for Fiction, the 2020 ASME Award for Fiction, a 2020 NEA fellowship, and a 2021 Wallace Stegner fellowship from Stanford University. His writing has appeared in The Paris Review, American Short Fiction, The Best American Magazine Writing 2020, and elsewhere. Jonathan earned his MFA in Fiction from the University of Minnesota and attends USC’s Ph.D. in Creative Writing and Literature Program as a Provost Fellow.
Speakers Exhibitors
Wednesday June 14, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

LGBTQ+ Lowell Open Mic
Wednesday June 14, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Come on down to the cafe for a night celebrating local LGBTQ+ talent. Whether you're an amateur or a seasoned professional we want to hear your songs, stories, and poems, see your dance routines, and laugh til our sides hurt at your stand up bits. Emcee Resi Ibañez is a Filipinx genderqueer poet, writer, and community storyteller, who believes in storytelling as a way of building community. They have been published in bklyn boihood’s Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity, LOAM magazine, and will soon be published in Blue Oak Press’s upcoming anthology They Rise Like a Wave: an Anthology of Asian American Woman Poets, as well as Loom Press’s Atlantic Currents: Connecting Cork and Lowell. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/1770488649764214/ .


Exhibitors
Wednesday June 14, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852
 
Friday, June 16
 

6:00pm EDT

The Openest Mic
Friday June 16, 2023 6:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Unleash your voice at "The Openest Mic"! Join us for an extraordinary evening of inspiration, collaboration, and joy through poetry, song, and however else you can think to express yourself.

Experience connection with a vibrant community of fellow creatives who are eager to listen as well as share. Savor coffees, adult beverages, and grilled cheese sandwiches from Smokestack Roasters: all ages are welcome and encouraged to join. You don’t want to miss this remarkable night! Bring your poems, your songs, your stand up sets, we’re waiting to hear! #TheOpenestMic
Friday June 16, 2023 6:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Smokestack Roasters
 
Monday, June 19
 

11:00am EDT

Fire Goes Out Without Wood: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Catherine Reed
Monday June 19, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
In Fire Goes Out Without Wood, Catherine Reed’s latest poetry collection invites us to journey with her to where ministry and poetry meet. We will encounter a couple in their senior years holding hands, laughing and skipping down the street like two teenagers. A mother grieving her son in jail sits in a rest home waiting. The Intruder who does not discriminate. A child who stares and no longer recognizes grandmother who now wears a mask. We will hear the words of a six-year old perched on her daddy’s shoulders “my daddy’s going to change the world” and moments later her dying daddy pleading for his life with a knee on his neck. After 63 years of marriage one who sits with tears streaming down weather- beaten cheeks waiting to proceed. What God whispers to us when the flames of love dwindle and ending with her dedication For The God Who Knows My Name. Catherine Reed is an ordained minister and poet. She is the author of Crossing BoundariesBetween Midnight and Dawn, and Sankofa. She is a winner of the Barbara Pilon Poetry Contest and a winner of Dark Horse Third World Contest. She’s a mother, grandmother and great grandmother. “Ministry keeps me grounded, poetry helps me dream, and my family keeps me real.”
Speakers
Monday June 19, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, June 21
 

11:00am EDT

Northfield Authors & Artists Festival
Wednesday June 21, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Designed to be an annual event, Authors and Artists, had been planned as a destination festival
for Northfield, MA on June 13. When the pandemic struck, we adapted and moved online. The
festival is still free, and open to all, but now accessible to a wider audience. Spreading the
festival out over all 4 Saturdays in June, from 11am to 2pm avoids concurrent programming, and
allows people to register for one or more weeks. The festival will still include opportunities for
local authors and artists to participate with an online art show, nature poetry coordinated with
Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust, and readings each week.

Headline speakers include the Vermont mystery writer Archer Mayor; National Poet Beat
Laureate Paul Richmond; writer of African-American history Dr. Gretchen Holbrook-Gerzina;
women's rights activist and memoire author Dr. Lise Weil; peace activist-poet JuPong Lin; art
educator Dr. Simone Alter-Muri; and Abenaki author Cheryl Savageau. Children's programming
includes authors Deanna Cook (kids cooking) and Christina Uss (bikes, books, and persistence).

For a full schedule of events including ways to join in see our website:
authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com
Registration is open on the website or using this link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DUj_BdkcTmGZld6mBHWfOQ

Funded in part by Massachusetts Local Cultural Council money from Northfield, Gill,
Bernardston, and Warwick; Greenfield-Northampton Cooperative Bank; Kiwanis Club of
Northfield, MA; Greenfield Savings Bank; Deerfield Valley Art Association; Dickinson
Memorial Library; and the Northfield Historical Commission.
Press contact: Lisa McLoughlin 413-475-0650; Lisa@hemlockhouse.net
Wednesday June 21, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Zoom
 
Wednesday, June 28
 

11:00am EDT

Northfield Authors & Artists Festival
Wednesday June 28, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Designed to be an annual event, Authors and Artists, had been planned as a destination festival
for Northfield, MA on June 13. When the pandemic struck, we adapted and moved online. The
festival is still free, and open to all, but now accessible to a wider audience. Spreading the
festival out over all 4 Saturdays in June, from 11am to 2pm avoids concurrent programming, and
allows people to register for one or more weeks. The festival will still include opportunities for
local authors and artists to participate with an online art show, nature poetry coordinated with
Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust, and readings each week.

Headline speakers include the Vermont mystery writer Archer Mayor; National Poet Beat
Laureate Paul Richmond; writer of African-American history Dr. Gretchen Holbrook-Gerzina;
women's rights activist and memoire author Dr. Lise Weil; peace activist-poet JuPong Lin; art
educator Dr. Simone Alter-Muri; and Abenaki author Cheryl Savageau. Children's programming
includes authors Deanna Cook (kids cooking) and Christina Uss (bikes, books, and persistence).

For a full schedule of events including ways to join in see our website:
authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com
Registration is open on the website or using this link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DUj_BdkcTmGZld6mBHWfOQ

Funded in part by Massachusetts Local Cultural Council money from Northfield, Gill,
Bernardston, and Warwick; Greenfield-Northampton Cooperative Bank; Kiwanis Club of
Northfield, MA; Greenfield Savings Bank; Deerfield Valley Art Association; Dickinson
Memorial Library; and the Northfield Historical Commission.
Press contact: Lisa McLoughlin 413-475-0650; Lisa@hemlockhouse.net
Wednesday June 28, 2023 11:00am - 2:00pm EDT
Zoom
 
Friday, June 30
 

7:30pm EDT

The Poetry Brothel: Drag Me to Salem
Friday June 30, 2023 7:30pm - 10:30pm EDT
The Poetry Brothel celebrates pride with a special emphasis on the divine art of drag! Don your best high femme, divine masc, non-binary, and gender fluid lewks and fly that freak flag in all its glorious colors with us. Celebrate the glittery patina of performance at our mainstage, then cozy up in a private room with the poet of your choice to unveil the many layers underneath. Doors at 730pm, show starts promptly at 8pm
VIP tickets include premium seating, a swag bag of mystery surprises, and two tokens for private a reading.
At The Poetry Brothel, a “madam” presents a rotating cast of poets, artists, and artisans who operate within self-constructed character, “erupting into verse in public and luring guests into back rooms for private readings,” as described in The New Yorker. Central to The Poetry Brothel experience is the creation of character, which for each artist serves as disguise and freeing device, enabling The Poetry Brothel to be a place of uninhibited creative expression in which artists and audience members alike can communicate more authentically.
Artists performing with the Brothel are women, men, folx, people of color, queer, straight, emerging, established, local, and international. Their characters are faeries, sea creatures, witches, aliens, virgins, whores, and everything in between. Some of the artists within The Poetry Brothel universe perform sex work in their off-hours. The Poetry Brothel uses its platform to support sex workers and to educate audiences about the sex industry. At this event, we will be supporting NAGLY and North Shore Health Project.

Friday June 30, 2023 7:30pm - 10:30pm EDT
Diehl Marcus & Company
 
Monday, July 3
 

2:30pm EDT

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O'Brien
Monday July 3, 2023 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday July 3, 2023 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, July 9
 

4:00pm EDT

Poetic Beasts: A Virtual Panel of Poets Discussing Animals
Sunday July 9, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
The Worcester Public Library is pleased to present a virtual panel of poets who’ve written about animals. Featuring poets Maura MacNeil, Susan Roney-O’Brien, and B.G. Thurston, each panelist will share some of their work, discuss what drew them to writing about animals, and tell stories about their pets and other beastie encounters.

Maura MacNeil is a writer, editor and a professor of creative writing at New England College. She is the author of three poetry collections and is the founder and editor of the website Off the Margins. She serves on the board of the Monadnock Writers’ Group and is a New Hampshire Humanities-to-Go program presenter with the interactive writing workshop: Family, Memory, Place: Writing Family Stories.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.

After a career in computers and finance, B.G. Thurston now lives on a sheep farm in Warwick, Massachusetts. In 2002, she received an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College. She has taught poetry courses at Lasalle College, online at Vermont College, and conducted many poetry workshops. Her first book, Saving the Lamb, by Finishing Line Press was a Massachusetts Book Awards highly recommended reading choice. Her second book, Nightwalking, was released in 2011 by Haleys. Her third book about the history of her 1770’s farmhouse titled Cathouse Farm will hopefully be published this year. She hopes to return to teaching and editing poetry as soon as the pandemic recedes.
Sunday July 9, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, July 11
 

12:30pm EDT

Shelter in Place: Writing Where We Are (7 week poetry workshop)
Tuesday July 11, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EDT
Since the onset of the pandemic, many of us have been struggling with anxiety and fear. In more recent weeks, many of us have been struggling with rage and hope as social justice and violence sweep across America. In this poetry workshop, we will take the term “Shelter-In-Place” as a directive to "Take Solace in Place," investigating how to more deeply see the places we live and how we live in them.

By engaging specifically with Place through poetry, this workshop is an opportunity to become re-centered during this time of uncertainty, clarify our process, and to deepen meaning in our day-to-day lives. We will engage newly with what is outside of our windows at present. What does it mean to be here, now, and what before this particular moment in time might we have overlooked?

Each class includes the following, related to the idea of Place:

A short group meditation
Reading and discussion of the craft in poems by authors such as Terrance Hayes, Natalie Diaz, Marilyn Nelson, and Ted Kooser
In-class writing prompts and sharing new work (sharing work is totally optional!)
Free-writing in response to recorded poems by authors such as Natasha Trethewey and Walt Whitman
And more !!

Space is limited to 15 participants, in order to foster a warm and safe space for connectivity and community. No writing experience is necessary, and this class is open to anyone ages 14 and up. Participants should attempt to be as close to a favorite window as possible during class, as you may want, from time to time, to gaze outwards…! Come prepared with a writing utensil and a notebook. Readings and audio will be screen-shared, as well as being searchable online or distributed to participants via email.

Class Schedule: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/shelter-in-place-writing-where-we-are-7-week-poetry-workshop-tickets-106439708032

July 10 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
July 17 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
July 24 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
July 31 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
August 7 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
August 14 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
August 21 from 12:30 pm - 1:45 pm PST
Registration for the full seven weeks is open now! If space allows, registration for individual classes will open on June 5.

About your instructor: Sophie Klahr

Sophie Klahr is a poet and educator who prefers to be outdoors, and finds herself writing mostly about spirituality, animals, land, gender, and desire. She is the author of Meet Me Here at Dawn (YesYes Books) and her poems can be found in publications such as The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, Poetry London, Ploughshares, Poetry Ireland Review, and elsewhere. The 2019-2020 Kenan Visiting Writer at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, Sophie is the recipient of fellowships and residencies from the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Stadler Center for Poetry and Literary Arts. She is a recurrent long-term artist-in-residence at Art Farm, a residency in rural Nebraska, where her favorite bedroom is the highest point for miles and miles and miles.
Speakers
Tuesday July 11, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, July 12
 

7:00pm EDT

LGBTQ+ Lowell Open Mic
Wednesday July 12, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Come on down to the cafe for a night celebrating local LGBTQ+ talent. Whether you're an amateur or a seasoned professional we want to hear your songs, stories, and poems, see your dance routines, and laugh til our sides hurt at your stand up bits. Emcee Resi Ibañez is a Filipinx genderqueer poet, writer, and community storyteller, who believes in storytelling as a way of building community. They have been published in bklyn boihood’s Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity, LOAM magazine, and will soon be published in Blue Oak Press’s upcoming anthology They Rise Like a Wave: an Anthology of Asian American Woman Poets, as well as Loom Press’s Atlantic Currents: Connecting Cork and Lowell. More info at https://www.facebook.com/events/1770488649764214/ .


Exhibitors
Wednesday July 12, 2023 7:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Coffee and Cotton 250 Jackson St, 4th Floor, Lowell, Massachusetts 01852
 
Thursday, July 13
 

3:00pm EDT

Rosebud Ben-Oni: Poet Wrestling in the Land of a Thousand Dances
Thursday July 13, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The New England Poetry Club, Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters, and Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site are pleased to announce the 2020 Virtual Summer Poetry Festival. This year’s festival will take place live online and connect poetry lovers across the country with remarkable poets who will read and discuss their work. This year, which marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, the festival places special emphasis on women poets.

The featured poet for July 12 is Rosebud Ben-Oni.

Events are free and open to all, but require advance registration at https://bit.ly/rosebud-ben-omi
Speakers
Thursday July 13, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, July 25
 

12:00am EDT

Slate Roof Press Chapbook Contest/Elyse Wolf Prize
Tuesday July 25, 2023 12:00am - 11:30pm EDT
TBA
Slate Roof Press announces its Annual Poetry Chapbook Contest. The winner receives publication, $500, and will become an active member of the press. Slate Roof’s award-winning bookmaker produces beautiful books with letterpress covers and high-quality papers. DEADLINE JULY 31, 2020.

Based in Greenfield, MA, Slate Roof is a member-run, not-for-profit collaborative, which has published the best new voices in poetry in art-quality chapbooks since 2004.

Tuesday July 25, 2023 12:00am - 11:30pm EDT
TBA
 
Thursday, July 27
 

11:00am EDT

Cross-Border Poetry Open Mic
Thursday July 27, 2023 11:00am - 12:30pm EDT
The border is closed to people but open to poetry! Open mic for poets from anywhere in the world, with an emphasis on building community between US and Canadian poets. Free/by donation.

Thursday July 27, 2023 11:00am - 12:30pm EDT
Online

3:00pm EDT

Afaa Michael Weaver: Spirit Boxing
Thursday July 27, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The New England Poetry Club, Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters, and Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site are pleased to announce the 2020 Virtual Summer Poetry Festival. This year’s festival will take place live online and connect poetry lovers across the country with remarkable poets who will read and discuss their work.

The featured poet for July 26 is Afaa Michael Weaver.

Events are free and open to all, but require advance registration at https://bit.ly/afaa-michael-weaver
Thursday July 27, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, July 30
 

7:00pm EDT

An evening of poetry with four poets
Sunday July 30, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Register at the following site: https://www.libraryinsight.com/eventdetails.asp?jx=gxp&lmx=%CF%60b%27%A9%ACw&v=3

Once you register, a Zoom link will be sent to you shortly before the reading. Thank you!
Speakers
Sunday July 30, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Cary Memorial Library
 
Monday, August 7
 

2:30pm EDT

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O'Brien
Monday August 7, 2023 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday August 7, 2023 2:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Online
 
Thursday, August 10
 

3:00pm EDT

María Luisa Arroyo & Peter Covino: Poetry in Translation
Thursday August 10, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The New England Poetry Club, Friends of Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters, and Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site are pleased to announce the 2020 Virtual Summer Poetry Festival. This year’s festival will take place live online and connect poetry lovers across the country with remarkable poets who will read and discuss their work. This year, which marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, the festival places special emphasis on women poets.

The featured poets for August 9 are María Luisa Arroyo & Peter Covino.

This event is free and open to all, but requires advance registration at https://bit.ly/poetry-in-translation.
Thursday August 10, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, August 13
 

4:00pm EDT

Open Mic Friday
Sunday August 13, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Poets, let your voices be heard! Whether you’ve written an original piece or would like to share a favorite poem written by someone else, the mic is yours and we’re all ears. The suggested theme for this month’s open mic is poems about animals.
Sunday August 13, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, August 18
 

7:00pm EDT

Danez Smith presents Homie
Friday August 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Registration is required. Zoom link will be sent out prior to the event.

Danez Smith (they/them) is a Black, Queer, Poz writer & performer from St. Paul, MN. Danez is the author of Don’t Call Us Dead (Graywolf Press, 2017), winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection, the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award, and a finalist for the National Book Award, and [insert] boy (YesYes Books, 2014), winner of the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry. Danez is a member of the Dark Noise Collective and is the co-host of VS with Franny Choi, a podcast sponsored by the Poetry Foundation and Postloudness. Danez’s third collection, Homie, was published by Graywolf in January 2020.

Homie is Danez Smith’s magnificent anthem about the saving grace of friendship. Rooted in the loss of one of Smith’s close friends, this book comes out of the search for joy and intimacy within a nation where both can seem scarce and getting scarcer. In poems of rare power and generosity, Smith acknowledges that in a country overrun by violence, xenophobia, and disparity, and in a body defined by race, queerness, and diagnosis, it can be hard to survive, even harder to remember reasons for living. But then the phone lights up, or a shout comes up to the window, and family—blood and chosen—arrives with just the right food and some redemption. Part friendship diary, part bright elegy, part war cry, Homie is the exuberant new book written for Danez and for Danez’s friends and for you and for yours.
Speakers
Friday August 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Cambridge Public Library
 
Monday, September 11
 

12:00pm EDT

POETRY: The Art Of Words/Mike Amado Memorial Series
Monday September 11, 2023 12:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Music Features: Tali Freed & Lars Wicklund
Poetry Features: Carolyn Gregory & Doug Holder
Open Mic Follows Music & Poetry Features
Doors Open: 11:30am, Free Admission & Refreshments
Monday September 11, 2023 12:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Plymouth Center for the Arts

3:30pm EDT

Benefit for the Boston National Poetry Month Festival, 2018 Sonia
Monday September 11, 2023 3:30pm - 5:30pm EDT
Purchase tickets online or at the door
Monday September 11, 2023 3:30pm - 5:30pm EDT
10 Brookline Ave, Cambridge MA
 
Tuesday, September 12
 

7:00pm EDT

Workshop for Publishing Poets: PoemWorks
Tuesday September 12, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Allen West, Brittany Perham, and Open Mic
Tuesday September 12, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Newtonville Books
 
Wednesday, September 13
 

5:00pm EDT

Mass Poetry Unplugged at Prudential Center
Wednesday September 13, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Join Mass Poetry for a series of readings at The Prudential Center in Boston. Aaron Smith, Enzo Silon Surin and Amy Mevorach will perform their work in the outdoor courtyard, Boylston Plaza at 800 Boylston St., Tuesday, September 12th from 5 - 7 pm.
Wednesday September 13, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Boylston Plaza

6:00pm EDT

6:00pm EDT

Poetry Reading
Wednesday September 13, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Wednesday September 13, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Cambridge Public Library

7:00pm EDT

Chuck Carlise Poetry Reading and Book Signing
Wednesday September 13, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
IN ONE VERSION OF THE STORY is a lyric exploration of the ways human beings confront desire, loss and absence by creating stories. It begins with from the French folk legend of “l’Inconnue de la Seine”—the unidentified young woman who drowned herself in Paris in the 1880s, and whose (unauthorized) death mask was eventually cast as the face of Resusci-Anne CPR training dummies—but eventually the book encompasses a chronicle of personal loss, a history of photography, a study of the mechanics of breathing, and a solo climb to the rim of a Mediterranean volcano. Ultimately, it is story-making itself which is interrogated, however the book seeks not to recreate narratives, but rather to understand why they matter—why and how we give them the meaning that we do.
Wednesday September 13, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Trident Booksellers & Cafe
 
Friday, September 15
 

6:00pm EDT

Night Slam
Friday September 15, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Night Slam Every 2nd Thursday Of The Month
Open-Mic 6:30pm/Poetry Slam 8:15pm/Refreshments
More Info: Www.Brocktonarts.Org
Friday September 15, 2023 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Stacy Adams Cultural Arts Building

7:00pm EDT

Caroline Smith Poetry Reading
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Grolier Book Shop

7:00pm EDT

Duxbury Poetry Circle
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
In the Setter Room; More Info: Ctzaremba@Gmail.Com
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Duxbury Library

7:00pm EDT

Caroline Smith
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Friday September 15, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Grolier Book Shop
 
Saturday, September 16
 

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Saturday September 16, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Susan Donnelly's newest poetry collection is The Maureen Papers and Other Poems, from Every Other Thursday Press. She is also the author of Capture the Flag, Transit, Eve Names the Animals, and six chapbooks. Her poems have been published in the New Yorker, Poetry, Prairie Schooner, Agni, and many other journals, anthologies, textbooks, and online. Susan teaches poetry in classes and consultations from her home in Arlington, Massachusetts.

James R. Whitley's poetry has been widely published and nominated for the Pushcart Prize. His most recent collection, Songs for Solo Voice, won the 2021 Red Mountain Press Poetry Prize. His prior collections include Immersion (winner of the 2001 Naomi Long Madgett Poetry Award), This Is the Red Door (winner of the Ironweed Poetry Prize and the Massachusetts Book Award) and The Goddess of Goodbye. Currently, Whitley is a Dean at Post University in Waterbury, Connecticut.
Saturday September 16, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, September 17
 

2:00pm EDT

Brockton Library Poetry Series 'Everyone Has A Voice'
Sunday September 17, 2023 2:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
3rd Saturday Of The Month
Poetry Features: Regie Gibson & Brockton High School Sr, Leylani Moniz
Open Mic Sign Up: 1:30
Sunday September 17, 2023 2:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Driscoll Gallery, Brockton Public Library

3:00pm EDT

Powow Poetry reading series
Sunday September 17, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Sunday September 17, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Newburyport Public Library

4:00pm EDT

Boston AIR 2.0 Celebration
Sunday September 17, 2023 4:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Join us at the Emerson Urban Arts Media Art Gallery on Saturday, September 16th, as we celebrate the culmination of the second year of Boston Artists in Residence.

Meet the artists and community members! Celebrate diverse art making in Boston! Join our conversation on the importance of civic practice, social justice, and resiliency!

Music, film screenings, light snacks, and beverages! 

Remarks by BCYF Commissioner Will Morales will begin at 5 PM. Followed by an artist panel moderated by BAC and Boston AIR Director Karin Goodfellow.
Sunday September 17, 2023 4:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Emerson Urban Arts Media Gallery 25 Avery St, Boston, MA 02111-1004
 
Monday, September 18
 

2:00pm EDT

Brookline Poetry Series
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 3:30pm EDT
TBA
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 3:30pm EDT
TBA

2:00pm EDT

Plein Air Poetry Walk
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Old Frog Pond Farm & Studio

2:00pm EDT

Plein Air Poetry Walk
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The public is invited to join the poets on Sunday, September 17, 2017, as we walk together to the sites of inspiration and share our poems. This year’s theme is memoir. Each poem was started en plein air at old frog pond farm, and the initiating impulse was from objects, plants or animals, or settings, located in the farm’s landscape.

A chapbook of the original poetry will be available at the event, and there will be a reception following.
Monday September 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Old Frog Pond Farm & Studio

4:00pm EDT

Gallery of Readers series 2017-2018 opening reading!
Monday September 18, 2023 4:00pm - 5:30pm EDT
Kathie Fiveash and Rebecca Hart Olander are reading together to launch the 2017-18 Gallery of Readers series, and to introduce Kathie’s new chapbook, Earthbound.

Please join us at Smith College in Seelye Hall 106 on Sunday, September 17 at 4 p.m. for reading, celebration & book signing.
Monday September 18, 2023 4:00pm - 5:30pm EDT
Smith College, Seelye Hall

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Monday September 18, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Deana Tavares is a creatively fluid artist, poet, songwriter activist, and actor. Growing up on the south coast of Massachusetts, many of life's hurdles only further strengthened her drive toward the arts. Her deep connection to the natural world and humanity is regularly reflected through her visual artwork, poetry, and songwriting. An avid visual artist, writer and maker, her work can be found on saveprouty.comengagingpeace.com., jummyjeenz.com, and Art On The Trails - Marking Territory 2019 chapbook.

Ed Meek writes poetry, fiction, articles and book reviews. His new book of poems, High Tide, has just come out. He has been published in The Sun, The Paris Review, Plume, The North American Review. He lives in Somerville with his wife Elizabeth and his dog Mookie, whom he will never trade.

Email Holly Guran at hguran@aol.com to register and receive the Zoom link. 
Monday September 18, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, September 19
 

2:00pm EDT

Book Launch for Convictions of the Heart by John L. Holgerson
Tuesday September 19, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
John L. Holgerson is the author of three books of poetry, Convictions of the Heart (In Case of Emergency Press 2021), Unnecessary Tattoo and Other Stains on a Stainless Steel Heart (Finishing Line Press 2016) and Broken Borders (Wasteland Press 2012). He has published poems in small literary journals, both in print and online. He has been a featured poet at poetry venues in southeastern Massachusetts (Poetry: The Art of Words; Calliope; Arts & Humanity among others) and the greater Boston area (Chapter and Verse). He also produced, moderated and read at the 2016 MassPoetry Festival presentation of Poets at the Bar: Five Practicing Massachusetts Attorneys Who Are Published Poets. He is listed in Poets & Writers’ Directory of Poets and Writers; is one of three MassPoetry representatives for Bristol County, Massachusetts; and is the founder of the Poetry as Verdict project providing a public venue for high school student-poets to read their work. His author’s web site is www.johnlholgerson.com

Richard Berg is a writer, poet, performance artist, and photographer. He is the former host of For the Love of Words on Easton Cable Access Television which program provides a venue for regional poets and musicians to read and perform their work. He has read at numerous Slam Poetry events and performed on stage as poet Edgar Allan Poe. He is also a public speaker on the subject of Overcoming Adversity as an advocate for the Brain Injury Association of Massachusetts and victims of brain injury.
Tuesday September 19, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
The District Center for the Arts

4:00pm EDT

teXtmoVes
Tuesday September 19, 2023 4:00pm - 5:30pm EDT
A poetry/dance/music interdisciplinary adventure with live performances and 2 streamed videos of diverse stylistic and thematic collaborations of an individual poet, dancer(s), music sometimes recorded, sometimes live.
Tuesday September 19, 2023 4:00pm - 5:30pm EDT
Starlight Square
 
Wednesday, September 20
 

9:00am EDT

Kerri French, Jennifer Militello, and Sarah Sweeney
Wednesday September 20, 2023 9:00am - 9:30am EDT
Wednesday September 20, 2023 9:00am - 9:30am EDT
Trident Booksellers & Cafe

5:30pm EDT

Writing a Black Trans Past
Wednesday September 20, 2023 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
This hybrid talk/reading will consider time and timing as animating problems for black trans life writing. Drawing together poetry, personal narration, and something approaching a theoretical register, Cameron Awkward-Rich's remarks will be something of an experiment in answering the question: what does it mean to write a black trans past?

Cameron Awkward-Rich is a poet and scholar of transgender theory/cultural production. He is the author of two collections of poetry--Sympathetic Little Monster (2016) and Dispatch (2019)--and his critical writing has been published in Signs, Transgender Studies Quarterly, American Quarterly, and elsewhere. Presently, Awkward-Rich is an assistant professor of women, gender, sexuality studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Wednesday September 20, 2023 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

Arvind Mehrotra
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Smith College Poetry Center

7:00pm EDT

Arvind Mehrotra Poetry Reading
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Smith College Poetry Center

7:00pm EDT

Newton Free Library Poetry Series
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Meets At The Newton Free Library In Newton, Mass. 330 Homer Street. Director: Doug Holder 617-628-2313 Dougholder@Post.Harvard.Edu (Meets Second Tuesday Of Designated Months.7PM Open Mic.)

Ben Berman --Ben Berman’s First Book, Strange Borderlands (Able Muse Press, 2012), Won The Peace Corps Award For Best Book Of Poetry And Was A Finalist For The Massachusetts Book Awards. His Second Book Is Figuring In The Figure, Forthcoming From Able Muse Press In 2017. He Has Received Awards From The New England Poetry Club And Fellowships From The Massachusetts Cultural Council And Somerville Arts Council. He Is The Poetry Editor At Solstice Literary Magazine And Teaches In The Boston Area, Where He Lives With His Wife And Daughters.

Richard Waring---
Richard Waring’s Poems Have Appeared In The Comstock Review, Chest, Sanctuary, Contact II, Dark Horse, The American Journal Of Nursing,Mothering, Inward Springs, The Journal Of The American Medical Association,And Other Publications. Richard Has A B.A. In English Literature From Drew University And Attended The Jack Kerouac School Of Disembodied Poetics At Naropa Institute, Where He Studied The Poetry Of William Carlos Williams With Allen Ginsberg. From 1982 To 1988. He Is A Senior Layout Artist For The New England Journal Of Medicine. His Latest Collection Is What Love Tells Me.

Clara Silverstein---Clara Silverstein Is The Author Of Four Books, A Blogger About Historic Recipes At Heritagerecipebox.Com, And A Long-Time Writer In The Boston Area. She Has Taught At Grub Street, Inc., Consulted With Individual Writers, And Worked With Young Adults As A Tutor And At The Books Of Hope Literacy Empowerment Program. From 2008 To 2017, She Directed The Chautauqua Writers' Center, Which Sponsors Creative Writing Workshops And Author Programs At The Chautauqua Institution.
Wednesday September 20, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Newton Free Library
 
Thursday, September 21
 

7:00pm EDT

Salon of Shorts
Thursday September 21, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
An Evening Of Poetry, Music, Performance Or Random Acts Of Genius
More Info: Contact Www.Artsonthecape.Org
Thursday September 21, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
BARN AT COTUIT CENTER FOR THE ARTS
 
Friday, September 22
 

5:30pm EDT

Mei-mei Berssenbrugge Poetry Reading
Friday September 22, 2023 5:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Friday September 22, 2023 5:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
McCormack Family Theater

7:00pm EDT

For the Love of Words
Friday September 22, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Limited Seating; For More Info Rich Berg Beachchair@Verizon.Net
Friday September 22, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
ECAT STUDIOS
 
Saturday, September 23
 

6:30pm EDT

Amesbury Monthly Poetry Reading
Saturday September 23, 2023 6:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Therese Broderick is a community poet with an MFA in writing degree (2006) from Spalding University, retired from full-time employment. She has been active in the local writing community as an open mic reader, teacher, contest judge, critique group member, classroom guest, blogger, Board member, volunteer for Hudson Valley Writers Guild, Poet Laureate of a local tavern, and administrator for a MeetUp.com local poetry group. Some of her poems have won prizes both locally and beyond and her full-length collection of poetry, Breath Debt, was released in 2018. In addition, she has self-published several chapbooks, including Green-Weak, published online by Red Wolf Editions of Red Wolf Journal. Her current project is Terzanelle Tuesdays. https://theresebroderick.wordpress.com/writing-aterzanelle/

Please email Ellie O'Leary for Zoom link: ellieoleary@gmail.com
Saturday September 23, 2023 6:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, September 24
 

7:00pm EDT

Carle Johnson at Barnes & Noble 4th Saturday Poetry Open Mic
Sunday September 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
This month the 4th Saturday Poetry Open Mic will host it's regular open mic followed a reading by series host, Carle Johnson. Come out and read a poem or two in the open mic and stick around for the feature.

The group usually enjoys coffee and snacks at the in store café after the reading.
Sunday September 24, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Barnes & Noble Booksellers
 
Monday, September 25
 

3:00pm EDT

Frank O'Hara Prize Poetry Winners Reading
Monday September 25, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Winners will read from their manuscripts:
First Place - Richard Fox, "Skating On The Edge Of Flesh"

Second Place - Jeff Walt, "Each Morning I Rise Like A Sleepwalker And Rot A Little More"

Third Place - Jennifer Freed, "On Their Anniversary She Whispers His Name"

Honorable Mention - Marsha Kunin, "In The Garden Of The Blind Barbarian"
Monday September 25, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
First Unitarian Church, Worcester

3:00pm EDT

The Winners’ Reading for the WCPA Poetry Contest: The Frank O’Hara Prize
Monday September 25, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Join the winners of the 2017 WCPA Annual Poetry Contest: The Frank O'Hara Prize for a reading of their work and the work of contest judge, Lori Desrosier. There will be an opportunity to mingle over refreshments as well.

This year's winners include: First Prize - Richard Fox, Second Prize - Jeff Walt, Third Prize - Jennifer Freed, and Honorable Mention - Marsha Kunin. Contest Chairperson, Robert Steele, will moderate the ceremony.

Lori Desrosiers' books include The Philosopher's Daughter published by Salmon Poetry in 2013 and Sometimes I Hear the Clock Speak, Salmon Poetry, 2016. Her poems have appeared in Contemporary American Voices, Best Indie Lit New England, String Poet, Blue Fifth Review, and many other journals and anthologies. She is Editor-in-Chief of Naugatuck River Review, a journal of narrative poetry, and WORDPEACE, an online journal dedicated to peace and justice, and serves as an editor for several other publications. She teaches Literature and Composition at Westfield State University and Poetry in the Lesley University M.F.A. graduate program.

Monday September 25, 2023 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
First Unitarian Church

4:00pm EDT

Art on the Trails Ekphrastic Poetry Art Exhibit Closing Event
Monday September 25, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
After reading work from over 20 local and regional poets, jurors Maura Snell and Cynthia Franca have selected 25 poems by 13 writers for inclusion in a chapbook which features both the art and poetry and is generously published by The Tishman Review. These poets will read their work at the closing event for Art on the Trails 2017, a Plein Air Poetry Walk, on Sunday, September 24th beginning at 4 pm. Refreshments will be served. The chapbook will include the selected poems and the art installations that inspired them will be available for sale on that day. All proceeds of the sale of these books will help fund future Art on the Trails exhibitions.
Monday September 25, 2023 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Beals Preserve Route 30 Main Street, Southborough, MA

6:30pm EDT

A Celebration of Leonard Cohen In Song, Dance, & Poetry
Monday September 25, 2023 6:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Speakers
Monday September 25, 2023 6:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Arts and the Armory main stage
 
Tuesday, September 26
 

12:00pm EDT

Joanna Klink and Monica Youn Stratis Haviaras Poetry Reading
Tuesday September 26, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Speakers
Tuesday September 26, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Thompson Room
 
Wednesday, September 27
 

5:00pm EDT

Mass Poetry Unplugged at Prudential Center
Wednesday September 27, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Join Mass Poetry for a special U35 reading at The Prudential Center in Boston. Mollie Chandler, Carolyn Gibney and John McDonough will perform their work in the outdoor courtyard, Boylston Plaza at 800 Boylston St., Tuesday, September 26th from 5 - 7 pm.
Wednesday September 27, 2023 5:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Boylston Plaza

5:30pm EDT

Writers Read Monthly Reading Series~At the Lee Library
Wednesday September 27, 2023 5:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Live readings from writers Jonathan Baumbach and Stephen Campiglio. 
Wednesday September 27, 2023 5:30pm - 7:30pm EDT
Lee Library

6:00pm EDT

Amesbury Public Library Opens Fall Poetry Series with Featured Poet Toni Treadway
Wednesday September 27, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Amesbury Public Library fall poetry series opens on Tuesday, September 26th ,6:00- 7:30 PM, with local poet and poetry organizer Toni Treadway. Toni has been a member of the Powow River Poets of Newburyport for about fourteen years. She is co-organizer of their reading series at the Newburyport Library since 2015. In poetry she searches for music in nature and to understand odd struggles with odd friends. A handful are online in The Flea and The Poetry Porch: the Wild Men Wild Women edition. At the library she will read a new poem, "Sachem's Island", which is a story set in an earlier time in a great salt marsh. She restores old movie film for museums and archives and sings in the Newburyport Choral Society. Toni is a regular reader at the Whittier Home's Tapestry of Voices poetry event held each August. The library hosts a monthly poetry series with an open mic. Each month there is a featured poet followed by a discussion, an open mic and light refreshments. Lainie Senechal, Amesbury Poet Laureate, hosts this event. 149 Main St., Amesbury. Free and open to the public.
Wednesday September 27, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Amesbury Public Library

7:00pm EDT

Brockton Poetry Series features Anita D
Wednesday September 27, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Anita D is a spoken word artist and slam poet born and raised in Brockton. After moving to San Diego in 2013 she began to treat poetry as more of a career and less of a hobby. She was a member of the 2016 San Diego Slam Team that went on to take second place at nationals. She has since featured at many open mic venues, colleges and universities across San Diego and Boston. She hosted workshops for high school students on both coasts. Most recently, she appeared at The Staples Center and performed during an WNBA game.
Speakers
Wednesday September 27, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Brockton Arts

7:30pm EDT

Jessica Jacobs and Nickole Brown Poetry Reading
Wednesday September 27, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
JESSICA JACOBS’ Pelvis with Distance (2015) details the life of the painter Georgia O’Keefe and, in the words of Christopher Merrill, “discovers a vibrant music rooted in portraiture.” A finalist for the Lambda Literary award and winner of the 2015 New Mexico Book Award in Poetry, Pelvis with Distance draws on O’Keefe’s paintings, letters, and personal documents as well as the poet’s own experiences in Abiquiú, New Mexico, where O’Keefe lived for many years. Jacobs’ second full-length collection, Take Me with You, Wherever You’re Going, is forthcoming from Four Way Books in 2019. Jacobs majored in English at Smith and went on to earn an MFA from Purdue University. Currently, she serves as associate editor of the Beloit Poetry Journal and lives in Asheville, North Carolina with her wife, the poet Nickole Brown.

NICKOLE BROWN describes poetry as “a raw, muscular devotion to paying attention.” Brown aims to “knock poetry off its pedestal” and open readers to its multitude of possibilities. The narrator of Sister (2007), was born during a tornado to a 16-year-old “giggling, cigarette-sneak / mini-skirt-hike girl.” Library Journal named Brown’s second collection, Fanny Says, to its list of Best Poetry Books of 2015, and Patricia Smith proclaimed it “raucous and heart-rending, reflective and slap-yodamn-knee hilarious, a heady meld of lyrical line and life lesson.” Brown edits the Marie Alexander Series in Prose Poetry at White Pine Press, and teaches each fall at the Great Smokies Writing Program. She lives in Asheville, North Carolina with her wife, the poet Jessica Jacobs, and is at work on her next manuscript.
Wednesday September 27, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EDT
Smith College, Alumnae House Conference Hall
 
Thursday, September 28
 

6:30pm EDT

6:30pm EDT

Why Thoreau Still Matters: Lessons on Environmentalism & Civil Disobedience
Thursday September 28, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
200 years after Henry David Thoreau’s birth in Concord, Massachusetts, a distinguished panel will consider Thoreau’s lessons for today’s world. Explore how Thoreau’s ideas have informed 21st-century civil disobedience and contemporary conversations about humans’ relationships with the natural world.
Panelists will include artist and filmmaker PAUL TURANO (Wander, Wonder, Wilderness), LAURA DASSOW WALLS, author of the new biography, Henry David Thoreau: A Life, acclaimed memoirist HOWARD AXELROD(The Point of Vanishing), MARIA MADISON, president of The Robbins House: Concord’s African American History historic site, and the Rev. FRED SMALL, Minister for Climate Justice at Arlington Street Church.
This event is part of the series “Boston is Thoreau Country: A Multimedia Series Celebrating Thoreau’s Legacy in the Hub,” Co-Presented by Old South Meeting House, The Thoreau Society, and the Boston Literary District and co-sponsored by The Walden Woods Project. CHRISTOPHER LYDON (WBUR Radio host, “Open Source with Christopher Lydon”) will moderate the event.
This program is made possible with funding from the Lowell Institute. Free and open to the public, registration is requested here.
Thursday September 28, 2023 6:30pm - 8:00pm EDT
Old South Meeting House

7:00pm EDT

Michelle Hoover, Patricia Horvath, and Sam Witt Poetry Reading
Thursday September 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
Thursday September 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
TBA
 
Friday, September 29
 

3:00pm EDT

No Human is Illegal: A Conversation with Naomi Shihab Nye on Breaking Down Walls with Poetry
Friday September 29, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
How we can join together across borders of all kinds to build vibrant communities? This question is at the heart Naomi Shihab Nye s poems. It is also the question that will serve as the focus of No Human is Illegal, a community conversation with Naomi Shihab Nye on Thursday, September 28, 2017.

This event is sponsored by The Clemente Course in the Humanities, Worcester, with support from Mass Humanities and the Worcester Art Museum. Now in its fourth year serving Worcester, Clemente offers accredited college-level instruction to educationally and economically disadvantaged adults at no cost. Participants study literature, art history, moral philosophy, and U.S. History in a welcoming community setting.
Speakers
Friday September 29, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
Worcester Art Museum 55 Salisbury Street, Worcester, MA 01609

6:00pm EDT

Black Orators: By Word and By Pen
Friday September 29, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Join us for an evening of history, poetry and music.  
The program is a poetic and musical dedication to the unwavering persistence shared in three literary giants:  Maria Stewart (1803-1879), David Walker (c.1797-1830) and Samuel Allen (1917-2015).
Maria Stewart was the first woman to speak to a mixed-gender audience in public to address political topics. David Walker wrote and published An Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World.  As orators and publishers, both contributed to the African American literary canon. Maria Stewart and David Walker were good friends and neighbors on Joy Street.  After David died, Maria often quoted him and his efforts to unite black people. 
 
Samuel Allen, whose pen name was Paul Vesey, began his literary career in Europe where he was a contemporary of Richard Wright and James Baldwin.  First recognized in Europe in the late 1940s and early 1950s, his reputation spread to the U.S. in the 1960s.  His poetry books include Ivory Tusks and Other Poems and Paul Vesey’s Ledger.  Allen served on the Board of the Museum of African American History for over ten years.
 
L’Merchie Frazier, Director of Education, Museum of African American History will provide historical context.  Castle of Our Skins musicians will perform the work of black composers including String Quartets by Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson. Spoken word artist, Regie Gibson, will recite original poetry and select readings from the pens of Stewart, Walker and Allen. 
Friday September 29, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
African American Meeting House at the Museum of African American History 46 Joy Street, Beacon Hill

7:00pm EDT

Tribute to Marc Widershien
Friday September 29, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Speakers
Friday September 29, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
120 Poplar Street Roslindale

7:30pm EDT

 
Monday, October 2
 

11:00am EDT

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Monday October 2, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday October 2, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online
 
Tuesday, October 3
 

1:00pm EDT

Writing the Land Poets' Book Launch
Tuesday October 3, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Celebrate the independent books published by Writing the Land poets in 2021! Join us for an afternoon of poetry reading and celebration with the authors: Mike Bove, Robert Carr, Ann Day, Alice Fogel, Jason Grundstrom-Whitney, Katherine Hagopian Berry, Jesse Lovasco, and Suzanne Rancourt.
Tuesday October 3, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, October 4
 

7:00pm EDT

Solidarity Salon/ Virtual Version
Wednesday October 4, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Slate Roof poet Anna M. Warrock reads with Allison Adair, Jennifer Barber, Eileen Cleary, Karen Friedland, Jenna Le, Julia Lisella, Jennifer Martelli, Kevin McLellan, Deborah Schwartz, Enzo Silon Surin, and Cindy Veach.

The Solidarity Salon hosted by Lisa DiSero and Gloria Mindock gathers together local artists of various genres to share their creations in community spaces. The series aims to especially amplify the voices of women, people of color, immigrants, and LGBTQ persons.

Anna M. Warrock’s latest book, From the Other Room, won the Slate Roof Press Chapbook Award. Besides appearing in The Sun, The Madison Review, Harvard Review, and elsewhere, her work is anthologized in Kiss Me Goodnight, women writing on childhood mother-loss, a Minnesota Book Award Finalist. Her poems have been choreographed, set to music, and inscribed in a Boston area subway station. www.AnnaMWarrock.com

Live streamed via Facebook and YouTube. For more details see:
https://www.facebook.com/events/336928854412232
Wednesday October 4, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, October 8
 

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Sunday October 8, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Sponsored by Friends of the Roslindale Library

Yves Mary Jean is a poet, novelist, political activist and former Boston City Council candidate. His work has been published in French and in Haitian-Creole. His first novel, Tout Chen Pa Chen Nan Pòtoprens(Edisyon Lank Zetwal), has just been published. Yves headlined “The Politics of Translation,” at Bridgewater State University for their first annual Latin American Caribbean Studies Carnival Week.

Eileen Cleary, author of Child Ward of the Commonweath, is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Lily Poetry Review and Lily Poetry Review Books. She holds two MFA's in poetry. Recent work is published in The Sugar House Review, JAMA, West Texas Literary Review and Solstice: A Magazine for Diverse Voices, among others. 
To sign up for this Zoom reading, contact hguran@aol.com

Speakers
Sunday October 8, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, October 9
 

4:00pm EDT

Peculiar Heritage: A Virtual Poetry Reading with DeMisty D. Bellinger
Monday October 9, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
DeMisty D. Bellinger's debut full-length poetry collection, Peculiar Heritage, follows the inception of racism in the United States to our present political and social condition. Massachusetts poet Marge Piercy says that Bellinger "writes powerful, intelligent, and lyrical poems." Besides writing, DeMisty D. Bellinger is a poetry editor at Malarkey Books, an alumni reader at Prairie Schooner, and a professor at Fitchburg State University in Massachusetts. She has a BA in English from University of Wisconsin-Platteville, an MFA from Southampton College, and a PhD from the University of Nebraska. She is an alum of Bread Loaf and she attended the Vermont Studio Center on a fellowship.
Monday October 9, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Online

7:00pm EDT

Virtual Special Event: Bobby LeFebre Shares His Social Justice Poetry
Monday October 9, 2023 7:00pm - 8:15pm EDT
Please join us for this very special event with Colorado Poet Laureate, Bobby LeFebre! His poetry spans all of the social justice issues of our time - from George Floyd, Black Lives Matter, gun violence, politics, gentrification, and so much more. His words will make you think, his poetry will give you chills, and his persona will make the learning accessible.

Bobby LeFebre is an award-winning writer, performer, and cultural worker fusing a non-traditional multi-hyphenated professional identity to imagine new realities, empower communities, advance arts and culture, and serve as an agent of provocation, transformation, equity and social change. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Huffington Post, The Guardian, American Theater Magazine, NPR, and Poets.Org.

In 2019, LeFebre was named Colorado's 8 th Poet Laureate, making him the youngest and first person of color to be appointed to the position in its 100 year history. LeFebre holds a bachelor's degree in Psychology from the Metropolitan University of Denver and a master's degree in Arts and Culture from the University of Denver. Learn more about Bobby on his website.

Please register for this meeting and you will receive the program link in the confirmation and reminder notices - please check your spam folder for the emails and scroll to the bottom for the link. This program will be recorded with permission and we will upload it to our YouTube channel.

Contact us at caryprograms@minlib.net with any questions.

Sponsored by the Cary Library Foundation.
Speakers
Monday October 9, 2023 7:00pm - 8:15pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, October 15
 

5:00pm EDT

Note on a Blue Note in The Gospel of Barbecue--Lecture & Reading with Fred Moten
Sunday October 15, 2023 5:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
This event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Please register here: https://harvard.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_bgi_ZDqRQnuC6CAlOl2USA

Fred Moten will discuss a poem called "On Listening to the Two-Headed Lady Blow Her Horn," which is from Honorée Fanonne Jeffers's extraordinary collection, The Gospel of Barbecue. He will try to talk - in the wake and under the influence of Manolo Callahan, J. Kameron Carter, Ruby Sales and Frank Stewart - about how the disruption of the metaphysics of sovereignty which the physics of the barbecue undertakes is held, and held open, and released in Jeffers's rich musicality. After failing properly to analyze a musicality that defies analysis, he will ask you to join him in trying to join Jeffers in the incalculable rhythm she lays down, which blurs the line between blur and blue, intoned time and pitch, in the interest of a general, insovereign insurgency.

Fred Moten teaches in the Department of Performance Studies in the Tisch School of the Arts, New York University. His fields are black studies, poetics and critical theory and his special concern is the entanglement of social movement and aesthetic experiment. His latest book, written with Stefano Harney, is All Incomplete (Minor Compositions / Autonomedia, 2020).
Speakers
Sunday October 15, 2023 5:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, October 16
 

11:00am EDT

Complex Nests: A Virtual Discussion & Tutorial with Blackout Poet Jessica McHugh
Monday October 16, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Join poet Jessica McHugh in a discussion about her Bram Stoker & Elgin Award-nominated gothic blackout poetry collection, A Complex Accident of Life, created from the pages of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. She will also read pieces from her new collection Strange Nests and discuss the tragedy that inspired her to seek out the horror hidden in the classic novel, The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. Participants are encouraged to bring a pencil and page of prose from a book or magazine, as Jessica will share tips for exploring the craft of blackout poetry and lead attendees in the creation of their own piece. In addition to poetry, Jessica is an internationally-produced playwright and novelist, having written several horror and sci-fi/fantasy books, as well as the 5-book YA series, the Darla Decker Diaries.
Speakers
Monday October 16, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Online

7:30pm EDT

Robert Lowell Memorial Lecture Series featuring Poets Natasha Trethewey and Meg Fernandes
Monday October 16, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Poets Natasha Trethewey and Meg Fernandes are “coming” to BU! This Zoom Webinar is free and open to the public.

The reading followed by a Q&A will be Thursday, October 15th from 7:30pm - 9:00pm. More information can be found here: http://www.bu.edu/creativewriting/calendar/robert-lowell-memorial-lectures/. The Zoom link is: https://bostonu.zoom.us/j/93316819395?pwd=bVBIT0xzSi9VSXRQdmRlRTZYbWlpQT09. Attendees do not need to pre-register, but they will need to input their name and email address to join.

Monday October 16, 2023 7:30pm - 9:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, October 18
 

5:00pm EDT

An Evening with Kaveh Akbar: "THE WORD DROPPED LIKE A STONE: Sacred Poetics Under the Reign of the Money God"
Wednesday October 18, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
Today the great weapon used to stifle critical thinking is a raw overwhelm of meaningless language at every turn—on our phones, on our TV’s, in our periphery on billboards and subways. So often the language is passionately absolute: immigrants are evil, climate change is a hoax, and this new Rolex will make you irresistible. Interesting poetry awakens us, asks us to slow down our metabolization of language, to become aware of its materiality, how it enters into us. Sacred poetry, from antiquity to the present, teaches us to be comfortable sitting in mystery without trying to resolve it, to be skeptical of unqualified certitudes. In reminding us that language has history, density, complexity, such poetry becomes a potent antidote against an empire that would use empty, vapid language to cudgel us into inaction.

Kaveh Akbar’s poems appear in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Paris Review, Best American Poetry, and elsewhere. His second full-length volume of poetry, Pilgrim Bell, will be published by Graywolf in August 2021. His debut, Calling a Wolf a Wolf, is out now with Alice James in the US and Penguin in the UK. He is also the author of the chapbook, Portrait of the Alcoholic, published in 2016 by Sibling Rivalry Press. In 2022, Penguin Classics will publish a new anthology edited by Kaveh: The Penguin Book of Spiritual Verse: 100 Poets on the Divine In 2020 Kaveh was named Poetry Editor of The Nation. The recipient of honors including multiple Pushcart Prizes, a Civitella Ranieri Foundation Fellowship, and the Levis Reading Prize, Kaveh was born in Tehran, Iran, and teaches at Purdue University and in the low-residency MFA programs at Randolph College and Warren Wilson. In 2014, Kaveh founded Divedapper, a home for dialogues with the most vital voices in American poetry. With Sarah Kay and Claire Schwartz, he wrote a weekly column for the Paris Review called "Poetry RX."

Registration required.
Wednesday October 18, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EDT
Online
 
Thursday, October 19
 

7:00pm EDT

The Alan Feldman Week of Poetry: Poetry Reading by Daniel Tobin
Thursday October 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
The Framingham State University English Department kicks off its annual Alan Feldman Week of Poetry with a reading by award-winning poet, Daniel Tobin. Tobin is the author of eight books of poems, most recently From Nothing (Four Way Books, 2016), and Blood Labors (Four Way Books, 2018), as well as The Stone in the Air, his suite of versions from the German of Paul Celan (Salmon Poetry, 2018). The New York Times named Blood Labors one of the Best Poetry Books of the year for 2018. Among his awards are the Massachusetts Book Award in Poetry, the Julia Ward Howe Prize, the Stephen J. Meringoff Award in Poetry, and creative writing fellowships in poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Tobin will be reading poems from his latest books, along with new work.

Reservations are recommended, but not required, for this free event. Attendees may park for free in the University's Maynard Road and Salem End Road parking lots.
Exhibitors
Thursday October 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EDT
Framingham State University, Heineman Ecumenical Center
 
Friday, October 20
 

12:30pm EDT

MCC Visiting Writers Series presents DeMisty D. Bellinger
Friday October 20, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EDT
DeMisty D. Bellinger has published two books of poetry, Rubbing Elbows (2017, Finishing Line Press), and her new book, Peculiar Heritage (2021, Mason Jar Press). A writer of fiction and creative non-fiction as well, her work has appeared in many literary journals and magazines, including Necessary Fiction, Modern Poetry Quarterly Review, Kweli, The Ekphrastic Review, Diverse Voices Quarterly, Eureka Literary Magazine, and Forklift, Ohio. Her poetry, fiction, and essays have also been included in the anthologies From the Ashes: An International Anthology of Womxn’s Poetry, Best Small Fictions 2019, Nasty Women Poets: An Unapologetic Anthology of Subversive Verse, and Teacher Voice: An Anthology of Writing by Teachers. She is a poetry editor at Malarkey Books, an alumni reader at Prairie Schooner, and has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Vermont Studio Center, Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, and The Marge Piercy Intensive Poetry Workshop. DeMisty D. Bellinger teaches creative writing, African-American studies, and women, gender, and sexuality studies at Fitchburg State University. For more information and links to work by DeMisty D. Bellinger, see https://creativewritingmcc.wordpress.com/mcc-visiting-writers-series/
Friday October 20, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EDT
Middlesex Community College (Bedford Campus)
 
Saturday, October 21
 

7:00pm EDT

Rozzie Reads Poetry & Open Mic
Saturday October 21, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Krysten Hill is the author of How Her Spirit Got Out (Aforementioned Productions, 2016), which received the 2017 Jean Pedrick Chapbook Prize. Her work has been featured in The Academy of American Poets' Poem-a-Day Series, apt, B O D Y, Boiler Magazine, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Muzzle, PANK, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Winter Tangerine Review and elsewhere. The recipient of the 2016 St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist Award and 2020 Mass Cultural Council Poetry Fellowship, she received her MFA in poetry from University of Massachusetts Boston, where she currently teaches. You can find out more about her work at www.krystenhill.com

Christine Tierney’s debut collection of poetry, chicken+lowercase=fleur was recently published by Lily Poetry Review Books. Her poems and flash fiction have appeared in Fourteen Hills, Poet Lore, The Yalobusha Review, The Tusculum Review, Monkey Bicycle, Permafrost, Sugar House Review and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from The University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast Writing Program, and a BA in film from Emerson College. She is a funk and disco lover, a photoartist and a wannabe comedian.

Contact hguran@aol.com for Zoom link.
Saturday October 21, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EDT
Online
 
Sunday, October 22
 

1:00pm EDT

Online Poetry: Medicine for the Soul
Sunday October 22, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
Jessica Fisher is the author of Frail-Craft, which won the 2006 Yale Younger Poets Prize, and Inmost, which was awarded the 2011 Nightboat Poetry Prize. Her poems appear in such journals as The American Poetry Review, The Believer, The Bennington Review, The Colorado Review, McSweeney’s, The New Yorker, The Threepenny Review, Tin House, and TriQuarterly, and her translations have been published in The New York Review of Books and The Paris Review. She is co-editor, with Robert Hass, of The Addison Street Anthology. Her honors include the 2012 Rome Prize, a Holloway Postdoctoral Fellowship in Poetry, and a research grant from the Hellman Foundation. She holds a Ph.D. from University of California at Berkeley and is currently an associate professor at Williams College.

Contact Name: Wendy Pearson
Email Address: wpearson@cwmars.org
Speakers
Sunday October 22, 2023 1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
Online
 
Wednesday, October 25
 

1:00pm EDT

Listening to Nature: Workshop with Christian McEwen, author of World Enough and Time
Wednesday October 25, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
One of life’s great joys is finding time to listen -- whether to the scattered wonders of conversation or to the many voices of the non-human world: birdsong, wild wind, river’s sweep. In this bright fall workshop we will identify sources for the listener’s delight, and share ways to grow them into poems, songs and stories.

$25, needs-based scholarship available.

https://authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com/associated-programming/#ListeningToNature
Speakers
Wednesday October 25, 2023 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Online

6:00pm EDT

Let's Write Poetry
Wednesday October 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Are you a poet who’s looking to deepen your craft? Ever wanted to try your hand at poetry? Join local poet, editor, and literary coach Sara Letourneau for this monthly poetry workshop that's designed for beginners as well as long-time poets.

Using meditation, prompts, exercises, and discussion of published works, writers will come away with new poems in progress as well as renewed inspiration and energy for their craft.

Please bring your preferred writing tools (laptop, journal or notebook, writing utensils) for this workshop.

$30 Registration Fee, $20 for WeBreathe Members.
Speakers
Wednesday October 25, 2023 6:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
WeBreathe Wellness
 
Saturday, October 28
 

7:00pm EDT

OF CONSEQUENCE: AVOIDING DISASTER PORN.
Saturday October 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Phil Klay, author of the recently released Missionaries, and Tom Sleigh, author of The Land Between Two Rivers: Writing in an Age of Refugees and House of Fact, House of Ruin, in a conversation about Klay’s book, Missionaries: "Avoiding Disaster Porn."
Speakers
Saturday October 28, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EDT
Online
 
Friday, November 3
 

7:15pm EDT

Blacksmith House Poetry Series: Jeffrey Harrison and Nathalie Handal
Friday November 3, 2023 7:15pm - 8:15pm EDT
Jeffrey Harrison reads from a new collection, Between Lakes, with Nathalie Handal, author of Life in a Country Album.

The Zoom link, meeting ID, and password for this reading will be included in your confirmation email after you register. If you do not receive the confirmation email, please contact our registration office at 617-547-6789 ext. 1.
Friday November 3, 2023 7:15pm - 8:15pm EDT
Online
 
Monday, November 6
 

11:00am EST

Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Monday November 6, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday November 6, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

Cary Library Poetry Series: Steven Cramer, Jeffrey Harrison, Joyce Peseroff
Monday November 6, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Join us for a virtual poetry reading from three published poets: Jeffrey Harrison, Joyce Peseroff, and Steven Cramer. Please register to get the Zoom link and password; they will be sent in a confirmation email when you register and a reminder message the day before the event - please check your spam folder for the emails and scroll to the bottom for the link. Email caryprograms@minlib.net with any questions.

Steven Cramer is the author of five previous collections, most recently Clangings (2012) and Goodbye to the Orchard (2004), which won the Sheila Motton Prize from the New England Poetry Club and was named an Honor Book in Poetry by the Massachusetts Center for the Book. Recipient of two grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, he founded and teaches in the Low-Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing at Lesley University.

Petition is Joyce Peseroff’s sixth book of poems. She is the editor of Robert Bly: When Sleepers Awake, The Ploughshares Poetry Reader, and Simply Lasting: Writers on Jane Kenyon. Her fifth collection, Know Thyself, was designated a 'must read' by the 2016 Massachusetts Book Award. Recent poems and reviews appear in Consequence, On the Seawall, Massachusetts Review, and Plume. She directed and taught in UMass Boston's MFA Program in its first four years. Currently she blogs for her website, joycepeseroff.com, and writes the poetry column for Arrowsmith Press.

Jeffrey Harrison is the author of six full-length books of poetry, most recently Between Lakes, published by Four Way Books in September 2020. His previous book, Into Daylight, won the Dorset Prize and was published by Tupelo Press in 2014. His first book, The Singing Underneath, was selected by James Merrill for the National Poetry Series in 1987. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Bogliasco Foundation, among other honors. His poems have appeared widely in magazines and journals, as well as in Best American Poetry, The Pushcart Prize volumesand other anthologies, and been featured regularly on The Writer’s Almanac, American Life in Poetry, Poetry Daily, and other online or media venues.
Monday November 6, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Online
 
Wednesday, November 8
 

5:00pm EST

Language is Not an Animal We Can Train: A Reading and Talk with Eduardo Corral
Wednesday November 8, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
What happens if we follow language instead of forcing it to perform in certain ways? What happens if we center play instead of intentionality? In this reading/craft talk, I'll discuss strategies that have helped me complicate the poetic line, imagery, subject matter, and the lyric "I." After the reading, there will be a question and answer period.

Eduardo C. Corral is the son of Mexican immigrants. He's the author of Guillotine and Slow Lightning. He teaches in the MFA program in Creative Writing at North Carolina State University.
Speakers
Wednesday November 8, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
Online
 
Thursday, November 9
 

3:00pm EST

Virtual Poetry At the Concord Free Library: Jeffrey Harrison and Matthew Lippman
Thursday November 9, 2023 3:00pm - 4:15pm EST
Concord Poetry at the Library presents Jeffrey Harrison & Matthew Lippman: 

Please register here for the Zoom link!

Jeffrey Harrison reads from his sixth full-length book of poetry, Between Lakes (Four Way Books, September, 2020), where the death of the speaker’s father places him in the ever-shifting zone between the living and the dead while also sending him back into his journey to manhood. Old arguments are reimagined: What does it mean to be a man? What does it mean to be a participant in one’s life as well as a witness and recorder of the lives of others? The exploration of these questions leads to new discoveries, including the way time reshapes the vision of one’s life and alters relationships, remaking a shared history. Harrison’s other collections include The Singing Underneath (1988), selected by James Merrill for the National Poetry Series, Signs of Arrival (1996), Feeding the Fire (2001), winner of the Sheila Motton Prize from the New England Poetry Club, Incomplete Knowledge (2006), runner-up for the Poets’ Prize, and Into Daylight, published in 2014 by Tupelo Press as the winner of the Dorset Prize and selected by the Massachusetts Center for the Book as a Must-Read Book. View Harrison’s website for interviews in which he talks about the poet’s craft and samples
of his widely-published poetry. He lives in Massachusetts.

Matthew Lippman reads from Mesmerizingly Sadly Beautiful (Four Way Books, 2020), which won the 2018 Levis Prize in Poetry – a collection that “takes on issues of sex, politics, race, religion, and poetry, all subjects our mothers warned us not to bring up at a dinner party. At times dreamily or nightmarishly surreal, at others so realistic we laugh or cringe in recognition. It's outrageously American, crass, funny, fast talking, unbound, and yes, sadly beautiful.” – notes Levis poetry judge Dorianne Laux. Lippman is the author of five additional collections: A LITTLE GUT MAGIC (2018), SALAMI JEW (2014), AMERICAN CHEW (2013), winner of the Burnside Review Book Prize, MONKEY BARS (2010), and THE NEW YEAR OF YELLOW (2007) winner of The Kathryn A. Morton Poetry Prize and finalist for the 2008 Patterson Poetry Prize. Lippman is the Editor and Founder of the web-based project Love’s Executive Order (www.lovesexecutiveorder.com) and calls its weekly poems by different poets a chronicle of poetic protest during the current political time. Lippman holds an MFA with a concentration in poetry from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He lives in Massachusetts.
Thursday November 9, 2023 3:00pm - 4:15pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, November 12
 

4:00pm EST

Poetry Club: Open Mic Friday
Sunday November 12, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Poets, let your voices be heard! Whether you’ve written an original piece or would like to share a favorite poem written by someone else, the mic is yours and we’re all ears. The suggested theme for this month’s open mic is poems about food.  
Sunday November 12, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Online

5:30pm EST

 
Tuesday, November 14
 

7:30pm EST

Chapter & Verse Literary Reading Series
Tuesday November 14, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Allison Adair’s debut collection, The Clearing, was selected by Henri Cole for Milkweed’s Max Ritvo Poetry Prize and named a New York Times “New and Noteworthy” book. Allison’s poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Arts & Letters, Best American Poetry, Kenyon Review, Waxwing, and ZYZZYVA. They have been honored with the Pushcart Prize, the Florida Review Editors’ Award, and the Orlando Prize. Originally from central Pennsylvania, Allison now lives with her family in the Boston area, where she teaches at Boston College and Grub Street. The Clearing is available at local bookstores or through bookshop.org.

Robbie Gamble’s poems and essays have appeared in Cutthroat, RHINO, Rust + Moth, Scoundrel Time, and Tahoma Literary Review. He was the winner of the 2017 Carve Poetry prize, and was a 2019 Peter Taylor Fellow at the Kenyon Summer Writers Workshop. He serves as associate poetry editor for Solstice: a Magazine of Diverse Voices. After working for many years as a nurse practitioner with the Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program, he now divides his time between Boston and Vermont.

Susanna Kittredge’s poems have appeared in publications such as Barrow Street, 14 Hills, The Columbia Review and Salamander as well as the anthologies Bay Poetics (Faux Press, 2006) and Shadowed: Unheard Voices (The Press at California State University, Fresno 2014). She has an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Her first full-length collection, The Future Has a Reputation, was published by CW Books in January, 2020. She lives in the Boston area and is a member of The Jamaica Pond Poets workshop and the Brighton Word Factory, a bi-weekly open writing group. By day she teaches middle schoolers. The Future Has a Reputation can be purchased directly from the author by contacting her at https://susannakittredge.wixsite.com/mysite/contact. It is also available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

To receive a Zoom invitation with a link to the reading, email your name and email address to SandeeStorey@fastmail.fm before 10 am on Nov. 12.

You will be emailed a Zoom invitation with the link by noon Nov. 13. For security reasons, please do not publicize, post or broadcast the Zoom link itself. If people you know want to attend, you may send them the link, but please ask them also not to publicize, post, or broadcast the link itself.

For more information, check our website at http://jamaicapondpoets.com or email dorothy.derifield@gmail.com or call 617-325-8388. The next Chapter and Verse Literary Reading on Zoom in the 2020/2021 Series will be at 7:30 pm on Friday, December 11, 2020.
Speakers
Tuesday November 14, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
Online
 
Wednesday, November 15
 

3:00pm EST

Blogging: a panel of experienced bloggers answer your questions
Wednesday November 15, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Dr. Leo Hwang and associates will offer a workshop on blogging. This panel of experienced bloggers will answer your questions about how to get your voice out there. $5 to benefit A&A festival

https://authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com/associated-programming/#Blogging
Wednesday November 15, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, November 18
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Holly Iglesias
Saturday November 18, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Our second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

This week’s poet will feature Holly Inglesias, author of three collections of poetry— Sleeping Things; Angles of Approach; and Souvenirs of a Shrunken World—as well as a critical work, Boxing Inside the Box: Women’s Prose Poetry. Her most recent publication is a collaborative chapbook, Myth America (Anhinga Press), co-written with Maureen Seaton, Carolina Hospital, and Nicole Hospital-Medina. Holly has been awarded fellowships by the National Endowment for the Arts, the North Carolina Arts Council, the Edward Albee Foundation, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at the University of Miami, with a focus on archival and documentary poetry. Her current project is an intergenerational memoir in prose fragments with the working title Theories of Flight.
Speakers
Saturday November 18, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

Evening of Inspired Leaders
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
We are proud to announce Mass Poetry’s seventh annual Evening of Inspired Leaders, which brings together exceptional leaders from diverse fields to each read their favorite poem and reflect on its connection to their life and work. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are now planning a hybrid event, which will take place on Thursday, November 18, 2021, from 7-8 PM online and live at GrubStreet’s new Center for Creative Writing in Boston’s Seaport.

At Evening of Inspired Leaders we come together for inspiration, for poetry that speaks to our hearts, to our spirits, and to this moment, in all its complexity.

Funds raised at Evening of Inspired Leaders will help Mass Poetry produce its dynamic roster of free and low-cost poetry programs for thousands of people, young and old, across Massachusetts.
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
GrubStreet's Center for Creative Writing

7:00pm EST

Cervena Barva Press Zoom Reading Series
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Cervena Barva Press Zoom Reading Series featuring Dayna Leslie Hodges, Frannie Lindsay, & John L. Stanizzi. 

To RSVP and receive the Zoom link contact editor@cervenabarvapress.com
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Online

7:00pm EST

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Mic
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Matthew E. Henry (MEH) is the author of the poetry chapbooks Teaching While Black and Dust & Ashes. His full-length collection, the Colored page, is forthcoming from Sundress Publications. MEH’s recent poetry and prose is appearing or forthcoming in Autofocus, The Florida Review, Massachusetts Review, New York Quarterly, Ploughshares, Poetry East, and Shenandoah. You can find him at www.MEHPoeting.com writing about education, race, religion, and burning oppressive systems to the ground.

Connie Norgren is the author of Tonight’s Quiet which won the 2014 Bright Hill Poetry Book Competition as well as the chapbooks Falling Again from Finishing Line Press and Same Boat from 5 Spice Press. She is co-author of the book To Genesis, along with Lois Adams, Barbara Elovic, and Patricia Markert – also from 5 Spice Press. In November 2020 she was featured on the Arts Express radio program on station WBAI, hosted by Jack Shalom and in its online magazine.

Contact hguran@aol.com for Zoom link.
Saturday November 18, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Online
 
Monday, November 20
 

7:00pm EST

Rozzie Reads Poetry and Open Microphone
Monday November 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Sandra Lim is the author of the poetry collections Loveliest Grotesque and The Wilderness. Her work has appeared in The New Republic, Poetry, The New York Times, The Yale Review, and elsewhere. Her honors include a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Levis Reading Prize, and grants from MacDowell and The Vermont Studio Center. She is an Associate Professor at UMass Lowell.

Connie Nelson has published work in Bright Ideas, Field Notes, Portals, and Persimmon Tree. She holds Ed.M and Ed.D degrees in Community Education and Lifelong Learning from Harvard University and has written poetry all her life. She is a member of the Never Too Late to Be a Poet group, started by poet laureate Danielle Legros Georges and led by Sandee Storey, enabling her to share her work and explore a variety of poets, forms and themes.

To obtain a link, contact hguran@aol.com
Speakers
Monday November 20, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, November 25
 

7:00pm EST

A Virtual Thirsty Lab Poetry Reading with David Surette
Saturday November 25, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
Hosted by Worcester County Poetry Association

The WCPA is happy to help the Thirsty Lab poetry reading go virtual for their 4th (and occasional 5th) Tuesday reading. The next reading will be on Tuesday, November 24, 2020 when David Surette will be the feature.
Visit this link to register for the reading and Zoom will send you an e-mail with the meeting details and link.

David R. Surette’s new book of poetry is Malden, selected and new poems that feature his hometown Malden, Massachusetts. He is the author of five other collections: Wicked Hard, The Immaculate Conception Mothers’ Club, Young Gentlemen’s School, Easy to Keep, Hard to Keep In and Stable which was named an Honor Book at the 2005 Massachusetts Book Awards. He lives on Cape Cod
Saturday November 25, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
TBA
 
Saturday, December 2
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Malachi Black
Saturday December 2, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Our second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

This week’s poet will feature Malachi Black, author of Storm Toward Morning (Copper Canyon Press, 2014), a Lannan Literary Selection, a finalist for the Poetry Society of America’s Norma Farber First Book Award, and a selection for the Poetry Society of America’s New American Poets Series (chosen by Ilya Kamnisky). Black is also the author of two limited-edition chapbooks: Quarantine (Argos Books, 2012) and Echolocation (Float Press, 2010). His poems appear or are forthcoming in the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day series, AGNI, The American Poetry Review, The Believer, Boston Review, Harvard Review, The Iowa Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Narrative, The Paris Review, Ploughshares, and Poetry, among other journals, and in a number of anthologies, including Before the Door of God (Yale UP, 2013); Discoveries: New Writing from The Iowa Review (Iowa Review, 2012); and The Poet’s Quest for God (Eyewear Publishing [U.K.], 2016).

Black was born in Boston, Massachusetts and raised in Morris County, New Jersey. He holds a B.A. from New York University, an M.F.A. from the University of Texas at Austin‘s Michener Center for Writers, and a Ph.D. in English with a Creative Writing emphasis from the University of Utah. A 2019 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow, Black has also received fellowships and awards from the Amy Clampitt House, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Emory University, the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, the MacDowell Colony, the Poetry Foundation (a 2009 Ruth Lilly Fellowship), the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and Yaddo. Black was the subject of an Emerging Poet profile by Mark Jarman in American Poets: The Journal of the Academy of American Poets, and his work has several times been set to music and has been featured in exhibitions both in the U.S. and abroad, including recent and forthcoming translations into French, Dutch, Croatian, and Lithuanian. Black is an associate professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of San Diego and lives in California.
Speakers
Saturday December 2, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, December 3
 

5:00pm EST

White Whales, White Males, Whitehead with Lisa Jarnot
Sunday December 3, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
Host Organization: Center for the Study of World Religions, Harvard Divinity School

This event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Register here: https://harvard.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN__tZF8PfxT_CQCnSOK05ZQw

This lecture, which is part of the Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry, explores the doctrine of discovery that haunts American poetry. Lisa Jarnot engages in an autobiographical interrogation of what it means to be a woman in a male-centered experimental tradition, and what it means to have white privilege and write poetry. Several questions arise: What do we keep and what do we reject as we acknowledge the systemic racism and American exceptionalism that pervade even the most benign of bohemian writing communities? Is there something transcendent and healing in the poet’s love of making, knowing, and of forging human connections? How can social reckoning and personal romance co-exist in exploring (and having been influenced by) the writers of the Black Mountain School, the New York School, and the Beat Generation?

The Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry supports contemporary poets as they explore in-depth their own thinking on poetry and poetics, and give a series of lectures resulting from these investigations. Lectures are delivered publicly in partnership with institutions nationwide. Find out more about past, present, and future lecturers, and explore the archive at www.bagleywrightlectures.org.

Lisa Jarnot was born in Buffalo, NY and educated at the State University of New York at Buffalo. She is the author of several collections of poetry, including Some Other Kind of Mission (1996), Ring of Fire (2001), Black Dog Songs (2003), Night Scenes (2008), Joie De Vivre: Selected Poems 1992-2012 (2013) and A Princess Magic Presto Spell (2019). She co-edited An Anthology of New (American) Poets (1997), and her biography of San Francisco poet Robert Duncan, The Ambassador from Venus, was published by the University of California Press in 2012. She has been a visiting professor at Naropa University, Brooklyn College, and the University of Colorado, Boulder. She lives in Jackson Heights, Queens, is a Masters of Divinity candidate at New York Theological Seminary and is a minister at Safe Haven United Church of Christ.
Speakers
Sunday December 3, 2023 5:00pm - 6:30pm EST
Online
 
Monday, December 4
 

7:00am EST

New Moon Reading
Monday December 4, 2023 7:00am - 8:30am EST
Jim Dunn is a poet and author of Soft Launch (Bootstrap, 2008), Convenient Hole (Pressed Wafer, 2004), and Insects In Sex (Falling Angel Press, 1995). His work has appeared in several publications including spoKe, Polis, Bright Pink Mosquito, The Process, eoagh, Gerry Mulligan, Cafe Review, and The Battersea Review. He edited the John Wieners' journal, A New Book From Rome, with Derek Fenner and Ryan Gallagher of Bootstrap Press. Along with Kevin Gallagher, he also edited a feature on six Massachusetts poets, for Jacket 2 magazine.

John Mulrooney is a poet, filmmaker, and musician living in Cambridge, MA. He is the author of If You See Something, Say Something from the Anchorite Press and co-producer of the documentary ‘The Peacemaker’, from Central Square Films. He records and performs regularly with a number of groups in the greater Boston area. He is Associate Professor in the English Department at Bridgewater State University. His work has appeared in Fulcrum, Pressed Wafer fold’em zine, Solstice, The Battersea Review, Poetry Northeast, Spoke, Let the Bucket Down and others.
Monday December 4, 2023 7:00am - 8:30am EST
65 Washington St Weymouth, MA 02188

11:00am EST

Virtual Poetry Writing Workshop with Susan Roney-O’Brien
Monday December 4, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
This virtual poetry workshop is a vehicle for critique, a time of close reading and thoughtful responses that help craft the written word so that it says exactly what the author intends. The focus is the work itself. Poets are respectful of each other, value the craft, understand the courage it takes to have work critiqued, and make the final decisions about their own writing. Please join us. Writing prompts will be shared with registrants one week before the workshop, and we request you submit your work at least three days before the workshop to give attendees time to read your poem.

Susan Roney-O’Brien earned her MFA at Warren Wilson College and is the author of five poetry collections. She hosts monthly poetry readings, teaches workshops and coordinates the Stanley Kunitz summer writing series.
Monday December 4, 2023 11:00am - 12:00pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, December 5
 

3:00pm EST

Arrowsmith Press Fall 2021 Book Launch
Tuesday December 5, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EST
Join us for a wonderful reading by Alexandra Marshall, Robin Davidson, & Martin Edmunds. Hosted by Askold Melnyczuk.
Tuesday December 5, 2023 3:00pm - 4:30pm EST
Online
 
Thursday, December 7
 

12:30pm EST

Enchanting the Season
Thursday December 7, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EST
Dr. Patrick Curry is a writer and scholar living in London, England. He has a PhD from the University of London and has been a Lecturer at the universities of Kent and Bath Spa. He is the author of Enchantment: Wonder in Modern Life(2019), Ecological Ethics: An Introduction, rev. ed. (2017), and Deep Roots in a Time of Frost: Essays on Tolkien (2014), among other books. For more information as well as articles and papers, see http://www.patrickcurry.co.uk

A conversation about Enchantment: We will discuss Enchantment. A more in-depth and personal discussion than his presentation in the festival, together we will find individual sources of enchantment in our lives, and seek ways to keep them alive during this season of glitz and glamour. Free.

https://authorsandartistsfestival.wordpress.com/associated-programming/#Enchant
Speakers
Thursday December 7, 2023 12:30pm - 1:45pm EST
Online
 
Saturday, December 9
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Dane Cervine
Saturday December 9, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
The Stockbridge Library's second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

Join us in welcoming Dane Cervine to our online poetry series: The Refuge of Witnessing. Cervine’s recent books include Earth Is a Fickle Dancer (Main Street Rag), and The Gateless Gate – Polishing the Moon Sword, from Saddle Road Press in Hawaii, a cross-genre work of Zen koan & prose poems.Previous poetry books include Kung Fu of the Dark Father, How Therapists Dance, The Jeweled Net of Indra, and What a Father Dreams. Dane’s poems have won awards from Adrienne Rich, Tony Hoagland, the Atlanta Review, Caesura, and been nominated for a Pushcart. His work appears in The SUN, the Hudson Review, TriQuarterly, Poetry Flash, Catamaran, Miramar, Rattle, Sycamore Review, Pedestal Magazine, among others. Visit his website at: https://danecervine.typepad.com/

Dane Cervine lives in Santa Cruz, California, a small university town along the Monterey Bay coast just south of San Francisco. In addition to being a poet, Dane is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in private practice, and Emeritus Chief of Children’s Mental Health for the Santa Cruz County Mental Health & Substance Abuse Department. Dane is the father of two grown children–daughter Kelsey, who teaches AP History, and son Gabriel who is a spoken-word poet & activist. Dane’s wife Linda, directs an internal consulting firm at the University of California, San Francisco.

Dane received his BA from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1980, majoring in Religious Studies. This is where Dane first met Jack Engler, a visiting professor of Buddhism and Psychology, who inspired Dane’s subsequent study of Vipassana meditation and mindfulness practice. Dane went on to graduate school at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco, receiving his MA in Integral Counseling Psychology in 1984, and his license as a Marriage & Family Therapist in 1985. CIIS offered a unique environment blending western psychology with eastern philosophy, which has shaped Dane’s career and interests ever since.

Dane is a Zen practitioner with the PACIFIC ZEN INSTITUTE community, which emphasizes lay practice integrated with the Arts in a contemporary cultural form. He also practices with INSIGHT SANTA CRUZ and is a long-time mindfulness meditator in the Theravadin tradition.
Speakers
Saturday December 9, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, December 10
 

4:00pm EST

& Company: A Virtual Poetry Reading with Moira Linehan
Sunday December 10, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Moira Linehan will read from & Company, her fourth collection of poetry. In this collection she uses paintings from French and American Impressionists to imagine the work and world of her maternal grandmother, a seamstress and dressmaker in Paris in the late 1800/early 1900’s and then in Boston. She will discuss strategies for using paintings as triggers for poems, and give examples of the relationship between a poem’s subject matter and its form.

Moira Linehan is the author of four collections of poetry. Her first two, If No Moon (2007) and Incarnate Grace (2015), were published by Southern Illinois University Press. Dorianne Laux chose If No Moon as the 2006 winner of the Crab Orchard Series open poetry competition. Both books were named Honor Books in Poetry in the Massachusetts Book Awards. In 2020 she had two books come out. In June Slant Books published her collection Toward and in December Dos Madres Press brought out & Company. Linehan lives north of Boston.
Speakers
Sunday December 10, 2023 4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Online

7:30pm EST

Poetry of the Moon and Stars
Sunday December 10, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Experience poetry inspired by the night sky amid the celestial glow of the Berkshire Museum’s newest acquisition, the Museum of the Moon, on view in the Ellen Crane Memorial Room. Pieces by classic poets will be shared alongside new work by local writers, all evoking the moon, stars, and other celestial bodies.

Recommended for adults and teens. This event may include mature language and content.
Included with regular museum admission. All galleries open until 7:30. Pre-registration recommended.

Poets and readers wanted! Participants are welcome to read their own work or a piece by a chosen poet. Please fill out this form to participate: https://forms.office.com/r/AWhuEjdSDT

More information at https://berkshiremuseum.org/event/poetry-of-the-moon-and-stars/
Sunday December 10, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Berkshire Museum
 
Monday, December 11
 

7:00pm EST

Cervena Barva Press Book Launch
Monday December 11, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Cervena Barva Press Book Launch featuring Karen Friedland and Corey Mesler


TimeDec 10, 2020 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)


Meeting ID848 0912 3757


Passcode 320003


Invite Link https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84809123757?pwd=eXdIZCtRYzY5VlNYTzRnVndpNlE1Zz09




Monday December 11, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Online
 
Tuesday, December 12
 

7:30pm EST

Chapter & Verse Literary Reading Series
Tuesday December 12, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Joshua Coben’s second collection, Night Chaser (David Robert Books, 2020), was a finalist for the Vassar Miller Prize, the New American Poetry Prize, and the Donald Justice Poetry Prize. His first book, Maker of Shadows (Texas Review Press, 2010), won the X. J. Kennedy Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Atlanta Review, The Cincinnati Review, College English, Pleiades, Poet Lore, Poetry Daily, Salamander, and elsewhere. A St. Louis native, he is an elementary school teacher and librarian. He and his family live in Dedham. Visit him online at joshuacoben.com. His books can be purchased from Bookshop.org at the following links: Night Chaser, Maker of Shadows.

Steven Cramer’s sixth poetry collection is Listen (MadHat Press, 2020). His previous collections are The Eye That Desires to Look Upward,  The World Book, Dialogue for the Left and Right Hand, Goodbye to the Orchard, and Clangings. Goodbye to the Orchard won the Sheila Motton Prize from the New England Poetry Club and was named an Honor Book in Poetry by the Massachusetts Center for the Book. Recipient of two grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, he founded and now teaches in the Low-Residency Program in Creative Writing at Lesley University. Porter Square Books (https://www.portersquarebooks.com/product/listen-steven-cramer) has been selling Listen.

Petition is Joyce Peseroff’s sixth book of poems. She is the editor of Robert Bly: When Sleepers Awake, The Ploughshares Poetry Reader, and Simply Lasting: Writers on Jane Kenyon. Her fifth collection, Know Thyself, was designated a “must read” by the 2016 Massachusetts Book Award. Recent poems and reviews appear in Consequence, On the Seawall, Massachusetts Review, and Plume. She directed and taught in UMass Boston's MFA Program in its first four years. Currently she blogs for her website So I Gave You Quartz at joycepeseroff.com and writes the poetry column for Arrowsmith Press. To order Petition, go to: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/P/bo68082264.html

To receive a Zoom invitation with a link to the reading, email your name and email address to SandeeStorey@fastmail.fm before 2 pm on Dec. 10.

You will be emailed a Zoom invitation with the link by noon Dec. 11. For security reasons, please do not publicize, post or broadcast the Zoom link itself. If people you know want to attend, you may send them the link, but please ask them also not to publicize, post, or broadcast the link itself.

For more information, check our website at http://jamaicapondpoets.com or email dorothy.derifield@gmail.com or call 617-325-8388. The next Chapter and Verse Literary Reading on Zoom in the 2020/2021 series will be at 7:30 pm on Friday, January 8, 2021.
Speakers
Tuesday December 12, 2023 7:30pm - 8:30pm EST
Online
 
Thursday, December 14
 

TBA

Zvi Sesling
Thursday December 14, 2023 TBA
Thursday December 14, 2023 TBA
Temple Isaiah 55 Lincoln St, Lexington, MA 02421

TBA

Poetry in Spanish and Translations INTO ENGLISH AND INTO MUSIC
Thursday December 14, 2023 TBA
TBA
Pedro Granados, Lima, Perú, Ph.D (Hispanic Language and Literatures), Boston University. Poetry collections: Sin motivo aparente (1978), Juego de manos (1984), Vía expresa (1986), El muro de las memorias (1989), El fuego que no es el sol (1993), El corazón y la escritura (1996), Lo penúltimo (1998), Desde el más allá (2002), Poesía para teatro (2010), Poemas en hucha (2012), Activado (2014), Amerindios/Amerindians (2020), La mirada (2020) y Al filo del reglamento (2020). Currently he is president of “Vallejo sin Fronteras Instituto” (VASINFIN).

Leslie Bary teaches Latin American literature and culture at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, centering on avant-garde poetics and representations of race, and is a prisoners’ rights activist outside class. Her translation of Oswald de Andrade’s “Manifesto antropófago” has become a classic; English versions of César Moro’s La Tortuga ecuestre and Pedro Granados’ Enredadera are forthcoming. Current writing includes “Border Trouble: Anzaldúa’s Margins” and “Field Notes on the Carceral State: From Death Row to ICE Detention in Louisiana.” Amerindios can be bought from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Amerindios-Amerindians-Spanish-Pedro Granados/dp/1940075882/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=Amerindios&qid=1607355659&s=books&sr=1-2. La mirada (translated in Amerindios), can be bought from the bookstore Virrey: https://www.elvirrey.com/libro/la-mirada_70125027

Daisy Novoa Vásquez is a Chilean-Ecuadorian writer passionate about education, the arts, and intercultural understanding. She lives in Jamaica Plain and teaches at the Margarita Muñiz Academy. Daisy contributes to the Hispanic newspaper El Planeta and is the author of the poetry collection Fluir en Ausencia. Many of her writings have been published in print and online anthologies and literary magazines. Daisy was a writer in residence for the University of Massachusetts Boston and has participated in various literary festivals in the U.S., Latin America, and Europe. To purchase her book, go to https://www.artepoetica.com/book/fluir-en-ausencia/.

Alan Smith Soto, a resident of Jamaica Plain and a member of the Jamaica Pond Poets, was born in San José, Costa Rica. He is the author of three books of poems, Fragmentos de alcancía (Treasure Jar Fragments) (Cambridge: Asaltoalcielo editores, 1998), Libro del lago (Pond poems), (Madrid, Árdora Ediciones, 2014) and Hasta que no haya luna (forthcoming Feb. 2021, Huerga y Fierro Editores, Madrid).His translation of Robert Creeley’s Life and Death (Vida y muerte) was published in 2000 (Madrid: Árdora Ediciones). Libro del lago can be bought here: https://www.amazon.com/Libro-lago-Alan-Smith-Soto/dp/848802052X

Largely unknown today, Juana Borrero (May 17, 1877-March 9, 1896), one of Cuba’s early Modernist poets, delves deep into raw states of imagination, affliction, love, decay, and death, centering the subjective experience of the individual. She died of tuberculosis while in exile in Key West during Cuba’s war for independence at the age of 18.

Stephany Svorinić is a composer and vocalist. Her work has been premiered by the Radius Ensemble and International Contemporary Ensemble, and played on radio stations across the country. She obtained her undergraduate degree from NYU and a Master of Music in vocal performance at New Jersey City University. She graduated from the Longy School of Music in 2019 with a diploma in composition and is currently pursuing a master's in composition at Tufts University. Her Borrero project sets her translations of the poetry of 19th Century Cuban poet, Juana Borrero, to music. Stephany enjoys horror, animals, and all things numinous. If you’d like to tip the artist, please Venmo @stephanysvorinic.

To receive a Zoom invitation with a link to the reading, email your name and email address to SandeeStorey@fastmail.fm before 2 pm on Jan. 7. You will be emailed a Zoom invitation with the link by noon Jan. 8. For security reasons, please do not publicize, post, or broadcast the Zoom link itself. If people you know want to attend, you may send them the link, but please ask them also not to publicize, post, or broadcast the link itself.

For more information, check our website at http://jamaicapondpoets.com or email dorothy.derifield@gmail.com or call 617-325-8388. The next Chapter and Verse Literary Reading on Zoom in the 2020/2021 series will be at 7:30 pm on Friday, February 12, 2021.
Thursday December 14, 2023 TBA
TBA

3:00pm EST

Concord Poetry at the Library Series: Steven Cramer and Joyce Peseroff
Thursday December 14, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Join Steven Cramer and Joyce Peseroff who will read from their newest collections and talk about their practice and the influences of their small writing group of almost two decades on the elements of their craft.

Steven Cramer's sixth book Listen (MadHat Press, 2020), is a collection of lucid, smart portrayals of the “darker corners” of despair through scores of illuminating juxtapositions. Experimenting with many verse forms to give shape to the mind’s restless shifts and associations — absurdly funny, bracingly honest, and always sharp in thought and craft—the lyric testimony of Listen reaffirms the indispensable, if fragile, consolations of art. Cramer’s previous books of poetry are The Eye that Desires to Look Upward (1987), The World Book (1992), Dialogue for the Left and Right Hand (1997), Goodbye to the Orchard ( 2004)—winner of the 2005 Sheila Motton Prize from the New England Poetry Club and named a 2005 Honor Book in Poetry by the Massachusetts Center for the Book—and Clangings (2012). His poems and criticism have appeared in numerous literary journals, including The Atlantic Monthly, Field, Kenyon Review, The Nation, The New Republic, The Paris Review, Ploughshares, and Poetry, as well as in several poetry anthologies. He has taught at Bennington College, Boston University, M.I.T., and Tufts University; and he founded and now teaches in the Low-Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing at Lesley University.

Joyce Peseroff reads from her sixth collection, Petition (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2020). From privilege at a gas station to fraud in a memorial grove, Peseroff follows the faults of indifference and division that crack our impulses toward mercy and love. She nests fragmented tales of the overheard and overlooked—lonely widowers, a lost hiker, predatory trees, an angry jury—in poems that bring a formal restlessness to common speech. With wit and compassion, Petition renders the tense joys and vivid griefs of mortal and moral experience in the luminous moment when the ordinary becomes singular. Peseroff edited Robert Bly: When Sleepers Awake, The Ploughshares Poetry Reader, and Simply Lasting: Writers on Jane Kenyon. Her fifth book of poems, Know Thyself, was designated a “must read” by the 2016 Massachusetts Book Award. Recent poems and reviews appear in American Journal of Poetry, Consequence, On the Seawall, Massachusetts Review, Plume, Salamander, and on the website The Woven Tale Press. She directed and taught in UMass Boston’s MFA Program in its first four years. Currently she blogs on writing and literature at her website and writes a poetry column for Arrowsmith Press.
Thursday December 14, 2023 3:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Online

7:30pm EST

Solidarity Salon: poems & stories with music & dance!
Thursday December 14, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
The Solidarity Salon gathers together local poets, writers, and other artists to share their creations in community spaces. The series aims to especially amplify the voices of women, people of color, immigrants, and LGBTQ persons. Our event on December 14 will feature seven local writers, joined by musicians In Paik and Ju Hee Kang, plus dancer Liliana Jimenez. Donations collected at this event will go to On the Rise (https://www.ontherise.org/) in support of their Voices Together writing program. For more event info: https://thepoetpianist.com/home-2/music/
Thursday December 14, 2023 7:30pm - 9:30pm EST
The Lilypad 1353 Cambridge St. Cambridge
 
Friday, December 15
 

2:00pm EST

Brookline Poetry Series: Alan Shapiro and Dorian Kotsiopoulos
Friday December 15, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
December 15, 2019
Featured Reader: Alan Shapiro
Alan Shapiro has published many poetry collections (including Reel to Reel, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and Night of the Republic, finalist for both the National Book Award and the International Griffin Prize), four books of prose, including The Last Happy Occasion, finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Winner of the Kingsley Tufts Award, LA Times Book Prize, an award in literature from The American Academy of Arts and Letters, and The William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America, he is also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Recent books include Life Pig (poems), That Self-Forgetful Perfectly Useless Concentration (essays), and his latest, Against Translation (poems), all from University of Chicago press. Shapiro is the William R. Kenan, Jr., Distinguished Professor of English at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

Opening Reader: Dorian Kotsiopoulos
Dorian Kotsiopoulos has been featured at various poetry venues in Massachusetts. Her work has appeared in literary and medical journals, including Poet LoreSalamanderNew England Journal of MedicineJAMAWomen’s Review of BooksThird Wednesday, and Smartish Pace. Dorian loves studying poetry at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA.

Friday December 15, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Hunneman Hall, Brookline Village Library 361 Washington St. Brookline
 
Saturday, December 16
 

12:00pm EST

Online Poetry Series: The Refuge of Witnessing featuring Owen Lewis
Saturday December 16, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
The Stockbridge Library's second season, “Online Poetry: The Refuge of Witnessing” will provide a weekly poetry sanctuary to hear moving words, deepen our exploration of their meaning, and connect with each other. Join us each Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. It will be your port in a worldly storm.

Owen Lewis, author of three collections of poetry, most recently Field Light (Distinguished Favorite, 2020 NYCBigBookAward), and two chapbooks including best man (recipient of the 2016 Jean Pedrick Chapbook Prize, New England Poetry Club.) Prizes include Finalist, 2017 Pablo Neruda Award, and first prize, the 2016 International Hippocrates Prize for Poetry. His poetry has appeared in Nimrod, Poetry Wales, The Mississippi Review, Southward, Stay Thirsty Poets, and Presence. A professor of psychiatry at Columbia University, he teaches Narrative Medicine in the Department of Medical Humanities and Ethics. Field Light, set in Glendale, Mass., weaves a poetic tapestry of Berkshire history.
Speakers
Saturday December 16, 2023 12:00pm - 1:00pm EST
Online
 
Sunday, December 17
 

7:00pm EST

Poetry of the Season
Sunday December 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
The WCPA celebrates the Poetry of the Season on Tuesday, December 17, at 19 Carter in Berlin.  Gary Hoare and Ted Blackler will read two winter classics; Dylan Thomas' "A Child’s Christmas in Wales" and Beatrix Potters' "The Tailor of Gloucester", following a community open reading.  Bring winter-themed writing to share; it can be your work or that of someone else.
 
This event is free and open to the public.

Sunday December 17, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
19 Carter 19 Carter Street, Berlin, MA 01503

7:00pm EST

Nina McLaughlin Reading
Sunday December 17, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Tue, December 17, 7pm – 9pm
Where: 6 Plympton St, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA (map)
Description: Join us for a reading Nina MacLaughlinn reading from Wake Siren

Sunday December 17, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Grolier Poetry Bookshop Plympton Street Cambridge
 
Monday, December 18
 

2:00pm EST

Everyone Has a Voice
Monday December 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Laura Lamb Brown-Lavoie was born along the river called Charles—daughter of an English teacher and a Storyteller, she descends from mountain and ocean people in Western Europe and the British Isles. She has spent her adult life growing food and medicine plants for her community in the homelands of the Narragansett people around Providence, RI. The former co-host of the Providence Poetry Slam, she has twice represented Providence as a finalist at national slam competitions. Laura was the 2018 Fellow for Merit in Poetry from the RI State Council of the Arts, and the 2018-2019 Providence Public Library Creative Fellow. She is currently in residency with the Brown Arts Initiative developing a multi-media performance version of her book of poems Club Desire, forthcoming spring 2022 on Binch Press. Alongside her work with plants and poems, Laura serves as a birth doula and is in training as an ancestral medicine practitioner.

Emilia has been writing songs and poetry most of her life. She graduated from BHS in 2021 and has since spent much time helping those with mental illness. Emilia has volunteered for Amazing Grace, a non-profit that supports children who have incarcerated family members. She loves her sister, her friends, her tattoos, and is the master of Spotify playlists of all genres. She lives at home with her family and beloved schnauzer Princess Vespa. This is Emilia's very first feature, hopefully not her last.
Monday December 18, 2023 2:00pm - 4:00pm EST
Brockton Public Library
 
Tuesday, December 19
 

7:00pm EST

Translating Korean: Jake Levine and Sekyo Nam Haines in conversation with Janaka Stucky
Tuesday December 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Hysteria

The Transnational Series welcomes two Korean translators to discuss their work and their most recent translations with Janaka Stucky, the founding editor of Black Ocean.
About the translators:
Jake Levine is an American translator, poet, and scholar. He received his BA and MFA from the University of Arizona and is currently Abd in a PhD program in Comparative Literature at Seoul National University. He works as an assistant professor of creative writing at Keimyung University and as a lecturer at the Literature Translation Institute of Korea. He is the assistant editor at Acta Koreana, the editor for the Korean poetry series Moon Country at Black Ocean, and a group member of the experimental hip-hop / verse collective Poetic Justice.
Sekyo Nam Haines, born and raised in South Korea, immigrated to U.S. in 1973 as a registered nurse. She studied American literature and writing at the Goddard College ADP and poetry with the late Ottone M. Riccio in Boston, MA. Her poems have appeared in the anthologies Do Not Give Me Things Unbroken, Unlocking The Poem, and Beyond Words; and in the poetry journal Off the Coast. Her translations of Korean poetry has appeared in Harvard Review and The Seventh Quarry Poetry. She lives in Cambridge, MA with her family.
Speakers
Tuesday December 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:00pm EST
Brookline Booksmith

7:00pm EST

A Window on the World through the Eyes of the Zimbabwean Poet Togara Muzanenhamo
Tuesday December 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
A Window on the World through the Eyes of the Zimbabwean Poet Togara Muzanenhamo


Togara Muzanenhamo reads from his three collections of poetry. Muzanenhamo was born in Lusaka, Zambia and raised on a farm in Zimbabwe. He has studied in the Netherlands, France and the United Kingdom. His poems have been widely published in numerous international journals and broadcast on radio and television. His first collection, Spirit Brides (2006), was shortlisted for the Jerwood Alderburg First Collection Prize, his second collection, Gumiguru (2014), was shortlisted for the Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry and his third book, Textures ( 2014 -in collaboration with John Eppel) won the National Arts and Merit Awards for Literature. Muzanenhamo lives with his partner and children in Zimbabwe.
This event is co-sponsored by the New England Poetry Club.
Tuesday December 19, 2023 7:00pm - 8:30pm EST
Cambridge Public Library
 
Friday, December 29
 

7:00pm EST

Curt Curtin @ Listen! a poetry reading
Friday December 29, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Curt Curtin will present work from Curt's first full-length book of poetry, titled "For Art's Sake." Due to his low vision, Curt will introduce his poems which will be read by his wife, Dee.)

David Macpherson hosts a poetry open reading to kick off the night.

Friday December 29, 2023 7:00pm - 9:00pm EST
Nick's Bar & Restaurant 124 Millbury St, Worcester, MA 01610
 

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